Best Served Cold
by theHuntgoeson
Summary: London, 2020: A young WDC closes in on her mother's killer at last, and learns the truth about her mother's journey back in time. Sequel to "Decision Time" - retrospective Galex.
1. Arrest

**Disclaimer: I don't own Ashes to Ashes. BBC, Monastic and Kudos do.**

**This is something rather unusual. When I wrote "Decision Time", I had no thought of writing a sequel, but then this idea came along saying "Write me! Write me!", so I did. References to "DT" will be fully explained in due course, but all the same you will find this story much easier to understand if you've already read "DT".**

**I'm not sure yet what my fic response will be to the new, darker mood of Series 2, but I hope that this - which leapfrogs to a later time - will do to be going on with. Most of it was written before Series 2 started, but I might have to make minor amendments to later chapters, depending upon what happens during the rest of S2.**

**As always, your feedback would be very welcome.**

_**Revenge is a dish best served cold **_**- Sicilian proverb**

**London - February 2020**

A young WDC with a birthmark on her cheek, her mousey brown hair in an untidy French pleat, stood close to the side wall of the old house, gun in hand. She knew that, on this cloudy day, her shadow would not give her away, and that the overgrown garden would shield her from casual observers. And if _he_ knew she was there, it didn't matter. She was going after him anyway. She had waited so long for this. Nothing was going to stop her now.

Her radio crackled into life. "_Weston!_ Where the bloody hell are you?"

She angled it to her mouth, keeping her voice as low as possible. "I'm outside the house now, Guv. No sign of anyone having gone in or out. He's in there alone. I'm going in."

"Like hell you are! He's almost certainly armed. He's known to be dangerous. The place could be booby trapped for all we know. His friends could turn up at any time. Stay right where you are until we arrive. That's an order. We're only a couple of minutes behind you, and backup's on the way."

"No, Guv. If I wait, he might get away, and I'm not letting that happen. I'm going in now."

"Weston! _WESTON!_"

She shut the radio off and crept around to the back door. From her previous observations she knew that it fastened with a single slip catch which could be undone in ten seconds by a credit card. _Probably to give him a quick getaway. But he's not getting away from me._

"It's all right, Mum," she whispered. "I'll make him pay at last. Be with me." She took a deep breath, flipped the catch, and disappeared inside.

-oO0Oo-

Half a mile away, a tall, golden-haired man with brown eyes swore vilely into his radio, knowing already that he would not be heard. He grabbed the steering wheel and slammed on the accelerator. The powerful silver-grey Nissan took off like a rocket.

"What's up, Guv?" one of his companions ventured.

"Weston's gone into the house alone," the driver snapped curtly. "Have your guns out and ready. We don't know what we'll find when we get there."

"Yes, Guv."

"Dad," the driver muttered under his breath as he skidded around a corner on two wheels, "help me reach the silly cow in time!"

-oO0Oo-

The back door opened onto a passage which led through to the front hallway. On one side was a door to the kitchen. It was ajar and she moved it cautiously with her foot. It swung open to reveal a thin man in his seventies with long, straggly grey hair, who was eating a frugal breakfast.

"Police! Hands up!"

He looked up with some surprise and put his hands up, yet perhaps he was not so surprised as he should be. She felt a surge of adrenaline. _At last, Mum. At last._

"Arthur Layton," she said steadily, "you are under arrest on suspicion of people trafficking, drug trafficking, money laundering, the use of explosives, and - " her voice wavered for a moment - "of the murder of Detective Inspector Alexandra Drake. You do not have to say anything - "

"Well, well, if it isn't Molly Drake. The little ugly duckling."

She hadn't seen or heard him since that terrible day, but that insinuating voice still had the power to send chills down her spine. In the moment of her triumph, she suddenly had a perception of how he saw her - a police officer, wearing a dark trouser suit, consciously trying to be as much like her mother as possible, but small, plain, dumpy, without her mother's glorious beauty. All at once she felt diminished. She pulled herself together.

"I'm DC Weston now. I've changed, Arthur. You changed my life forever that day. That's why I'm here."

"I know, darlin'. I've been keeping an eye on you. Just as you have on me."

"Looks like we'll have to add illegal access to Government records to the charge sheet, then," she said lightly. This was bad, she knew it was bad. She shouldn't be allowing him to draw her into dialogue. He wasn't holding a gun, but there might be one, hidden among the breakfast things or on the dining chair beside him, out of her sightline. She should cuff him and get the hell out. But that pale gaze seemed to hypnotise her. _Was this how he made Mum feel, all_ _those years ago?_

"So, what're you goin' to do then? Shoot me?"

"Oh, no, Arthur. I'm an officer of the law. You won't turn me into a murderer. That would bring me down to your level. I'm here for justice. You'll go down at last for what you did to my mother and to me. I'll see to it that you die in jail."

"Shouldn't count on that, darlin'," he murmured nonchalantly. "Are you so sure your friend Evan White wants 'is day in court as much as you do?"

"Evan?" she snapped back. "He's committed to this, always has been."

"Are you sure?" he wheedled. "Are you sure he wants you to hear what I was goin' to tell your mother if he didn't play ball?"

"Don't you dare talk about her!" she hissed. "You knew she wasn't armed. She was so gentle. She didn't stand a chance. You shot her down in cold blood!"

"Had a job to finish," he said, stone-faced. "That was what I was trying to tell White. Thought she was the end of the job. Turns out you might be. You and one other person. I'm waiting for him before I finish this."

"Him, who? Evan?"

"No, not White. Someone else. Another old score." The sound of car brakes screeching to a halt outside intruded on their consciousness. "Sounds like 'im now."

_The Guv. He wants the Guv._

"To hell with waiting for him! You're under arrest, Layton. You're coming with me, now." Still holding her gun steady with her right hand, she reached with her left for the cuffs at her belt. She could hear the Guv bawling orders outside, then the unmistakable sound of his size sixteens pounding in through the back door and down the corridor, his minions in his wake.

"Just a few more seconds..." Layton crooned lovingly, reaching down with his right hand to the chair beside him.

"KEEP YOUR HANDS IN THE AIR!" she shrieked. Suddenly she was shoved to the ground from behind and a shot rang out over her head. She heard a scream of pain, and raised her head to see Layton, moaning and clutching his bleeding right hand as DS Bill Meredith jumped clean over her, dragged Layton face down across the table, and cuffed him. Layton struggled, and DC Frank Fordham edged around the group to help hold him down.

"What the bloody hell did you think you were doing, Weston?" an all too familiar voice snarled, directly above her. She raised her head to see the Guv standing over her, smoking gun in hand. Layton looked up.

"Well, well. DCI Hunt, I presume."

"You _do_."

"Thought so. You're the image of your father, but you've got your mother's eyes. Hunt and Drake, Drake and Hunt. Those two names always were my nemesis. Pity I couldn't be yours. Lost my chance to take out son and daughter together."

"Daughter?" Hunt was perplexed for once.

"Her." Layton jerked his head towards Molly, who still lay on the ground. "Should get her to tell you what her real name is."

Hunt opened his mouth to blast another question, but was forestalled by a shout from Fordham, who had just worked his way around the back of the table.

"Jesus! Guv, we've got to get everyone out of here, fast! There's a bundle of dynamite on the chair here, and wires leading out from it. Looks like they lead to the other rooms. He's rigged the whole house."

Hunt hauled Molly to her feet by the scruff of her jacket. "Bill! Read Layton his wrongs and take him back in Weston's car. I'm not having him bleeding all over the Nissan. Frank, call Bomb Disposal and get uniform backup. Weston, get the street evacuated and organise a cordon. We'll talk later."

Layton giggled weakly as Meredith hauled him out. "Hope you haven't shagged this one, Hunt. You'll be sorry if you did."

"And stop his foul gob while you're at it!" Hunt bellowed after them.

**TBC**

**A/N: The "I presume - you **_**do**_**"****exchange is lifted from Hugh Wheeler's book for Stephen Sondheim's **_**A Little Night Music**_**. Nobody who has seen Judi Dench and Patricia Hodge perform that dialogue will ever forget it.**


	2. Old History

**Disclaimer: The BBC, Monastic and Kudos own Ashes to Ashes. Unfortunately I don't.**

**Thank you so much to everyone who's read Chapter 1, and especially to those who've reviewed and favourited it. Reviews and feedback really do help so much. **

**Sorry, it'll be over a week until the next chapter because I'll be away. That means there may also be some delay in replying to reviews, but I WILL reply - I'm very good about that and I want to show how much I appreciate you all!**

Several exhausting hours later, Bomb Disposal had worked their magic. The house had been cleared of explosives and declared safe, terrified householders had been allowed to return to their homes, the street had been reopened to traffic, and the team had returned to the station. Back at Borough CID, Hunt and Meredith had given Layton a short, sharp interview, charged him with possession of explosives, conspiracy to cause an explosion and attempted murder, and remanded him in custody. Now it was Weston's turn.

DCI Sam Hunt generally kept his office door open, believing that an open door indicated an open mind. The exception applied if he was delivering a rollicking or discussing sensitive issues. Right now his door was firmly closed.

"Well, Weston." He was circling the chair on which she sat, pale and resolute. His voice was soft with menace and sarcasm, which she knew betokened an imminent explosion. "Right now I want to knock you down with one hand and pick you up with the other. Thanks to you, we've nailed a criminal with more records than the Beatles, who's been on our little list since I was a twinkle in my Dad's eye. But to do it you perpetrated the most irresponsible, stupid, unprofessional, selfish, unnecessary, idiotic stunt I have witnessed in the whole of my career. You disobeyed a direct order from your superior officer. You put your life and the lives of your colleagues and members of the public at wholly unnecessary risk. _What have you got to say for yourself?_" Although she was braced for it, the suddenness with which he snapped out the question made her jump.

"I'm sorry, Guv - "

"_Sorry? SORRY? _Sorry does not even _begin_ to cover it!" He paused, frustrated, and passed a hand over his brow. "This is all my fault."

"Of course it isn't, Guv - "

"Yes, mine. I made an error of judgement that put everyone at risk. I let you take the lead on this case because you're the walking Layton encyclopaedia. You've got the makings of a good copper, Weston. But if you're to get anywhere in this job you'll have to learn, _fast, _that people are trusting you with their lives. With everything. You have to work as part of a team. If you, or anyone, works against that, then the team is destroyed. Christ, Weston, people could have got _killed_ today because of you! Colleagues _and_ civilians. If Layton had succeeded in dynamiting the place, it could have demolished the houses on either side as well. If we'd lived, that would have finished your career - and I would have had the happy task of telling the relatives that you were responsible for the deaths of their loved ones. Didn't you_ think_?"

"I'm sorry, Guv," she repeated. "I know I did wrong by disobeying your orders. I know you'd be justified in never trusting me again. But can you please tell me what you'd have done if I'd waited for you to arrive?"

_"Eh?"_

"As I'm so wrong, Guv, will you please educate me?"

"For a start, you cheeky cow, I wouldn't have had to make such a spectacular entrance. You'd been holding him at gunpoint for some minutes when we arrived. It was stalemate and he knew it. That meant that he was on the alert for us to arrive and he was waiting for that before blowing the lot of us to kingdom come. I would never have sent a lone officer in. I'd have got backup to surround the house and got a negotiator - _not_ me, a proper negotiator - to keep him talking while armed officers got in the back way and disarmed him. Anything wrong with any of that, Miss Clever Clogs?"

"The last time a negotiator was used with him, he took her hostage and shot her," she said bitterly. "And, with respect, Guv, if we'd surrounded the place and then tried to negotiate, he might just have lit the fuse anyway. Result, even more loss of life. He's desperate and vicious and he's never cared whom he takes down with him. I knew I was taking a calculated risk with what I did. But he and I have old history. That was why I knew he'd keep talking. He'd want to torment me as long as he could, and I was relying on that to give you and the others time to arrive and back me up." _I'm the one taking a calculated risk now. I'm making this up on the hoof. If I were telling the truth, I'd admit that I went in on my own because I had to get Layton and nothing else mattered._

There was a tense silence as he assessed what she had said, his hazel eyes boring into hers. Sh held her breath and waited for the explosion.

"I'll give you this, Weston, you've got the gift of the gab and the cheek of the devil. What I planned _might_ have resulted in him detonating the house. But so might what you did, _against my orders_. Did you know that he'd rigged the house when you went in?"

"No, Guv, but I knew it was a possibility given his past form."

"And yet you took that risk? Playing the heroine and making yourself look bloody stupid."

She looked straight at him. "Layton had to be _my_ collar. You can fire me if you want. You can throw me in front of a disciplinary panel. Nothing else matters now."

"A bloody lot else matters!" Hunt snapped, marching behind his desk and leaning over it towards her. "Why this obsession with Layton, for God's sake? You've been the moving spirit in the drive to nail him, ever since he came onto our radar. Is this because of your "old history"?" He waggled his fingers.

"Yes."

"Thought so. So, let's get to the bottom of this. What exactly is this "old history"? He said this morning that I should get you to tell me what your real name is. Does that mean you've been in the Met under an assumed name all this time? Has he been blackmailing you?"

"Oh, no, the name's mine to use. I was born Molly Caroline Drake, and Weston is my married name. He knew me as Molly Drake, so when I joined the Met I called myself Caroline Weston. I know he's become an IT expert, and I hoped he wouldn't spot the name if he hacked Met personnel records. Doesn't seem to have worked," she added, grimacing. "He said he's been keeping an eye on me, as I have on him."

"_Molly Drake?_" He stared at her, open-mouthed.

"Yes, Guv." She was totally bewildered by his reaction to an unremarkable name.

"Just a minute - " He sat at his desk, logged onto his computer, and brought a record up on screen. From where she sat, she could not see what he was looking at. He pored over it for a few minutes in silence, then looked back at her as though he had never seen her before.

"Good God," he whispered.

"What is it, Guv?"

"Never mind now. You tell me why you put everything you have in jeopardy to get Layton."

"Because he murdered my mother."

"Oh, _Christ._ You should have told me you had a personal interest."

"And if I had, Guv, would you have taken me off the case?"

To her surprise, he stopped to consider. "Maybe, maybe not. You see, my family has old history with Layton too."

"I know, Guv," she said admiringly. "Your father took him down."

"It's more than that. I'll explain later. Strikes me you have a right to know. For now, we'll stick to Layton. And you. If I had taken you off the case, it would have been because you'd become too emotionally involved. Which is just what happened when you confronted him at last, and that was put all of us in danger."

She hung her head. "I know, Guv. But I had to be the one to arrest him. It was my fault that Mum was killed." She swallowed hard.

"Do you want to tell me about it?"

She nodded. "It was twelve years ago this month." Her voice was hard and toneless. If she thought too much about what she was saying, she knew that she would break down in front of her boss, and she couldn't afford to do that yet. Tears were for later. "My twelfth birthday. She was a hostage negotiator. She was driving me to school and a call came through that a man had taken a hostage outside the Tate Modern and was asking for her by name. It was Layton. Mum left me in the car and told me to keep the doors locked. But I was too worried to stay there. I got out and hid in the crowd. As I watched, Layton threw the hostage aside and turned his gun on Mum. I'd never seen her at work. I know now that she was negotiating with him, but I was only twelve, all I could think about was that she might be killed in front of me. I ran to her, and in doing that I ruined everything. Changed everything."

"Why?" Hunt's voice was gentler now, but not too gentle. He had gauged her emotional state.

"Layton grabbed me and put his gun to my head. He dragged me down the steps to the beach. When we'd got out of sight, he pushed me away, fired a shot in the air, and ran off. I ran the other way, back to Mum. The marksmen lost Layton and the search was stood down. Mum rang my school and said that I wasn't coming in that day, and rang Evan to take me home."

"Who's he?"

"Evan White, my godfather. He was Mum's guardian. He took me off to a café for some chocolate cake, and as we sat there chatting, Evan's mobile rang. We could both hear the voice on the other end. It was Layton. He said that he had Mum, and that he was going to tell her how her parents died."

"Her parents?"

"They died in a car bomb when she was eight. Evan and I have always suspected that Layton might have had something to do with that. They were criminal lawyers. Evan was their solicitor. Grandad represented Layton, and he'd got Evan to get Layton released that day. It's possible that he was in the pay of some bigger cheese who got him to kill them. He had form for explosives even back then."

Hunt's glare suggested that this was not the best time to mention that. "So what did Evan do when Layton phoned him?"

"He tried to keep Layton talking, but he rang off. He alerted the police and they instituted a search. Mum was found nearly twelve hours later, on an old boat that Layton owned, moored opposite the Millenium Dome. She'd been shot in the head and was in a coma. She was rushed to hospital and the surgeons managed to remove the bullet, but she didn't come round. She lingered for ages with Evan and me watching over her and talking to her, day after day after day. Then, four months after the shooting, her heart gave out." She had tried so hard to stay impassive, but now the tears were rolling down her cheeks as she relived it all. "Her car was found abandoned a couple of days after the shooting. Forensics found hair and fibres in the back seat which didn't relate to her or me. They didn't have any samples to match to Layton at that time, but the police judged that he must have got into the back seat and hidden while the car was unoccupied, and then got Mum at gunpoint when she got back in, and forced her to drive to his boat. So, you see, it was all my fault that she died. If I'd stayed in the car and kept it locked, Layton wouldn't have been able to get into it, and he wouldn't have killed her. That's why it's up to me to get him for what he did to her."

Hunt was torn between offering sympathy and keeping the atmosphere professional. He opted for the latter, guessing that she did not want to break down completely. She might need the former later. He brought Layton's records up on screen. "The trouble when someone like him pops over the parapet after years out of sight is, I don't have all the details in my brain box. I knew he killed a cop. Was that your mother?"

"Yes."

He studied the screen. "Detective Inspector A - _My God!_"

"What is it, Guv?"

Hunt's normally ruddy complexion was pale. _"Alexandra Drake?_ That was your mother's name?"

She stared at him, grief forgotten for a moment in astonishment at his reaction. "Yes. But she was always called Alex. What's wrong?"

"Nothing, it's just - I'll tell you later. Do you mean to say that you've been tailing Layton ever since, in the hope that one day you'd get him with his pants down?"

"Well, not ever since. As I said, I was only twelve at the time. There was a big search for him, but for three years there was no trace of him. It later turned out that he'd skipped over to the Netherlands and started business with some of his buddies in the drugs trade there. He didn't have any money to start with, but they took him on because he had a lot of expertise. Then they were arrested in a big police operation. He got away and came back over here. He was arrested on suspicion of Mum's murder and drug trafficking offences. I didn't know much about it at the time because Dad and Judy were shielding me from it as much as possible."

"Sorry, who?"

"I'd gone to live with my father and Judy, his second wife. He'd been pretty useless as a father while Mum was alive, but her death seemed to bring him to a sense of his responsibilities. He was brilliant after that. So was Judy. She was a good sort, always very careful to make it clear to me that she wasn't trying to take Mum's place. It can't have been easy for either of them, but they did all they could to give me a good, stable background in my teen years. I think Dad was a bit jealous because I was still so close to Evan, but he had the sense not to oppose it. He saw that Evan gave me a feeling of continuity. He'd always been there." She looked ruefully at Hunt. "I'm sorry, you asked me about Layton and I've been rabbiting on about myself."

Hunt looked very thoughtful. "Not at all. Go on."

"Layton's arrest caused a lot of bad feeling between the four of us. Dad and Judy wanted to protect me from it all as much as possible. They've never been into policing or law, and I think they were scared of reprisals against them or me from Layton or his associates, particularly if he was found not guilty. I, of course, was mad keen to be right in the thick of it. And poor old Evan was caught in the crossfire. He respected my wanting to be involved, and we knew that if it got to court we'd be key witnesses. But for some reason he was very worried about it. Maybe he was scared of Layton too, although he never said so. He was certainly under a lot of stress. His health broke down around then and he's never really been right since. But then Layton escaped before the trial."

"Hell's bells, how did that happen?"

She sighed. "Layton and a number of other prisoners were being transferred between prisons by a security firm. The van was attacked and all the prisoners were released. It's thought Layton wasn't the focus of the operation, there were a couple of suspected terrorists among those who got out. He was just collateral. There was a big stink about it and it led to a change in procedures, but the damage was done. Naturally priority was given to getting the terror suspects back. They were nailed in a couple of days, but Layton disappeared again, and I was devastated. That was when I decided that it was up to me to bring him to book if ever he surfaced again." She looked hard at Hunt. "That was why I became a police officer. To get him."

"And now you _have_ got him, at the cost of what was nearly a fatal operation, we have sufficient evidence to nail him on explosives offences, but after all this time, can we make a case against him for your mother's death? You're our resident Layton expert. Apart from todays's little sideshow, exactly what evidence have we got against him for all his other offences? Take me through it."

She took a deep breath. "Mum's murder first, then. At the time all we had was the phone call, which was traced but of course hadn't been recorded, and Evan's and my witness statements that it was Layton who called him and what was said. I could back Evan up as I overheard the call. In addition, the bullet was recovered and was retained as evidence. As I said, Forensics got samples from the car, which didn't relate to Mum or me but did match samples from the blankets found in the boat. Mum's DNA was there too, that was where she was shot - " She paused a moment and went on. 'The missing link was that they didn't have any samples from Layton. His last conviction had been in 1981, before DNA matching came in. That was when your father took him down."

"My father and mother both," said Hunt, glowing with pride. "They met working on that case. It was their first joint triumph."

"Really, Guv? I never knew that."

"Oh, it was quite a family affair. But more about that later. I interrupted you. Go on."

"We struck luckier when he was arrested after his return from the Netherlands. First, his gun was confiscated and is still held as evidence."

"That supposes that he was still using the same gun, three years on."

"It does, Guv, but it's a big, old thing, very distinctive, and it matches the type of bullet that was used to kill her. The ballistics test carried out then was inconclusive, but the science has advanced so much in the past nine years that there's a much better chance now of getting a match. Second, DNA samples were taken when he was arrested and they match those taken from the car and the boat. Third, there are records of the interviews carried out at the time. He never admitted to the murder, but he did admit to phoning Evan." She looked at Hunt almost pleadingly. "Evan's seventy now. He's the crucial witness and he's willing to testify. But his health's been bad for years. This could be our last chance to nail Layton while Evan's still able to help. If Layton manages to get off on a legal loophole again, as he did in '81, he'll only hop abroad again. After the breakout from the security van, he vanished off the radar for three years. Then colleagues abroad spotted him in South America."

"How the hell did he manage that? Weren't ports and airports alerted after the breakout?"

"So they were, Guv. He's always been into shipping and boats. A couple of old hulks along the Thames are still registered in his name. It's thought that he took a lifeboat or an inflatable from one of them to get down the Thames to the sea. There he joined a pleasure boat which took him round to Southampton and he stowed aboard a liner there. One of his old associates from the drug and boat businesses probably helped out. Name of Edward Markham."

"Ah, Nine Toed Eddie."

"Guv?"

"More family memories. They'll keep. What happened to Layton when he went to South America?"

"He went to Brazil. Hell of a place to extradite people from. He went into partnership there with a man called Luis Rodrigues Sandoval, who had a completely legitimate shipping business which was thought to conceal some pretty nasty sidelines."

"Drugs again?"

"Yes, plus people smuggling - illegal immigrants wanting to get to North America - and the vice trade. Unfortunately he had the local police and judiciary in his pocket, so he was never investigated. Then, late last year, Layton and Sandoval parted company. It's thought that Sandoval was thinking of retiring and wanted to pull out of the illegal activities so as to leave a clean business to his children, and Layton of course opposed that. Next thing, Sandoval's yacht blew up with him on it."

"Hm, Layton and explosives again."

"Precisely, Guv. Sandoval's widow went to the police claiming Layton was responsible, and she handed over all her late husband's business records, which showed that Layton was in dodgy dealings up to his neck. A warrant was put out for his arrest, but he'd already vanished again. He tried to get associates in the drug business in a couple of other Central and South American countries to hide him, but he'd become hot property and nobody would help. To be honest, I don't think the Brazilian authorities would have minded overmuch if it had just been Sandoval who'd died, he'd been a thorn in their side for a long time, but his yacht blew up in the marina where he berthed it, and the harbourmaster and four passers-by died, including a woman and her eight-year-old son. There was no way they could ignore that."

_"Jesus."_

"That's always been Layton's way, Guv, it never matters to him who's caught in the fallout. Mum should have been in the car when Gran and Grandad were blown up. She was only eight at the time. She only escaped because she got out of the car to chase a balloon. Layton thought he was finishing the job when he shot her," she added bitterly. "That was what he said this morning."

"Just a minute. Was your mother's maiden name Alex Price?"

Molly gaped. "Yes. But how on earth did you know that?"

Hunt looked as though he had been punched by a champion boxer."She and my family go back a long way. Don't let this distract us from the case. So, how did Layton get back to the UK?"

"We don't know for sure, but it looks as though he must have stowed away on a ship, probably a cargo vessel from Mexico, and melted into the background when it landed here. He's been away so long, he hasn't got many contacts over here now, but he knows a lot about those who are left, and he's been into blackmail for years. That's why he can always get people to help him. And he appears to have brought over a lot of money from South America. His bank accounts there were frozen when the warrant for his arrest went out, but he'd emptied some of them already. The house where he was arrested belongs to Edward Markham - er, Nine Toed Eddie, I think you called him, Guv - and Markham's been seen bringing supplies to the place. It looks as if Layton was hiding out there, just long enough to organise another flit to the Continent or maybe stow away on a long-haul boat going further east, where it would be harder for us to get him back. That's why I was so desperate to get him while I, while _we_, had the chance. Another ten minutes or so and Markham might have arrived to whisk him away."

She bowed her head, silent at last, drained. _I've done it for you, Mum. At last. But will it work?_

"Well done." She had never heard such warmth in the Guv's voice, and looked up at him in surprise.

"Guv?"

"Bloody good summary. When you told me you have a personal interest, I wanted to see whether you really knew the case, or were letting emotion cloud your judgement as you did this morning. You've demonstrated that you know your stuff. I charged Layton with the explosives offences today to make sure we could keep him banged up while we worked on the evidence for his other sins. Tomorrow Bill and I will interview that bastard again and charge him with your mother's murder."

"Oh, Guv - "

"I'm afraid that, now you've declared an interest, I can't allow you to take part in any interviews or allow you to take any further part in the case. It could compromise the investigation."

"Of course not, Guv."

"Just as well, too. During the interview Layton kept on about wanting to see you, said there were things he wanted to tell you. Even his own lawyer was trying to shut him up. That's why I thought he'd been trying to blackmail you. Sorry I misjudged you on that."

"That's all right, Guv."

Hunt looked very serious. "But you do realise that once the Brazilians know we've got him, they'll want to extradite him. They probably won't succeed because they don't have an extradition agreement with the UK, but he's got money, and that means he'll be able to get himself a tricky legal team who can stretch it out for years. And once his lawyers find out about your connection with the case - and they _will_ - they could try to claim that you've been carrying out a personal vendetta against their client. We've still got a long way to go on this one, and it may never get to court. Once it's gone to the CPP, it'll be out of our hands."

Molly's heart missed a beat. "Then we could lose him after all?"

"Well, given the _explosive_ nature of today's little showdown and the current concern over terrorist activity, I'd like to see the judge who grants him bail. I'd put money on him being kept in custody while the CPP and the Brazilians thrash it out. One way or another, we can expect him to go to trial, but it could be a long time ahead, and you'll have to accept that it _might_ not be in this country and it _might_ not be for your mother's death."

"Oh, God…"

"He'll stay in jail for the foreseeable future, and given his age and state of health, it's unlikely he'll ever go free again. Whatever happens, it'll be some justice," he added more gently. "Better than none."

Molly stared blankly ahead of her. "Yes."

"And remember, the CPP will fight tooth and nail to keep a cop killer for trial in the UK."

"Yes. Thanks, Guv. For everything." Her face and voice were completely expressionless.

Hunt sighed. "Going back to this morning. I'm afraid I'll have to enter on your personnel record that you disobeyed my order and put your colleagues and the public in danger. But I'll also record that the operation was successful and that you apprehended a dangerous criminal. It'll be an unofficial reprimand. That's the best I can do."

"Thanks, Guv," she repeated mechanically.

He tried to smile. "Ungrateful plonk. That the best you can manage when I'm saving your career?"

"I'm sorry, Guv, really I am. Of course I'm grateful for everything you're doing for me. More than I can say. But there's nothing left."

"What the hell are you talking about?" he snapped, hoping that brusqeness might help her more than sympathy.

"I've been waiting for this for so long." Her voice was quivering with a burden of unshed tears. "Now I've done it at last, and there isn't anything else beyond it. Nothing else to do. Nothing else to live for." She broke down at last, and a whole river of tears seemed to burst from her. Thanking Heaven that he had checked that the blinds were down before he called her into the office, Hunt dropped to his knees beside her and wrapped a long arm around her.

"Shh, shh. That's right. You've got to get rid of it," he murmured, as she burrowed her face into his shoulder and cried her heart out. "You've been carrying all of this alone for too long. It's over now. He's under arrest, and he isn't getting out. You've got to get rid of it all so you can start again."

"I - I can't - "

"Yes, you can. You will." He rocked her as gently as if she had been one of his own children. "It's over. Today's the first day of the rest of your life. A new chapter. You're starting over. Shhh...."

"No - "

"_Yes_. You've done what you had to do for your mother. I admire you for that. But do you think she would have wanted you to shrivel up into nothing, once you'd done it? Wouldn't she have wanted you to go on being the fine girl you are, and go on to even better things? You've still got the whole world in front of you."

"You - you sound just like Dad and Evan," she managed between sobs.

"Good. Shows you should listen more to your elders and betters. _Shhh..._"

It took a long time, but at last the storm blew itself out, and Hunt felt confident enough to leave her side long enough to pour her a glass of water.

"Get that down you. Sorry I don't keep anything stronger in the office. My Dad would have poured half a bottle of whisky into you by now. His universal panacea."

"Th - thank you, Guv," she hiccuped, mopping her swollen eyes and sipping the water, holding the glass between her hands as though her life depended on it.

"I'd send out for tea, but I don't think anyone should see you till you've had a few more minutes to recover."

She nodded gratefully. "But sooner or later they'll have to see me looking like this. God knows what they'll think."

"They'll think I've given you a classic Hunt bollocking. You've deserved it," he growled, but she caught the gleam in his eye. "No, I'll tell them the truth. That you've just disclosed to me that you have a personal interest in the case, and that you're understandably upset. Look, I'll leave you in here for a few minutes to calm down and call a birdtable in the main office to tell them. They'll understand, Molly. They're not bad lads and lasses, you know. By the way, _are _you Molly now, or are you still Caroline?"

She thought for a moment. "I'll answer to either, but I want to try to get used to being Molly again. I couldn't be her for such a long time."

He smiled. "Good. I'll remember that. Shouldn't be hard. My sister's a Caroline too. After her grandmother."

"What a coincidence. That was my grandmother's name too. My mother's mother, the one who was blown up."

Their eyes met. He looked as if he was about to say something, stopped, and then said something else.

"Look - Mols - "

"_What _did you just call me?"

He looked embarrassed. "Sorry about that. Association of ideas. My Dad's perpetual nicknames for my Mum were Bolly and Bols. Something to do with it being her favourite champagne. You've told me you're Molly again, and I thought, Molly - Mols. Hope you don't mind."

"No, not at all. It was what Mum and Dad always used to call me when I was a kid. It's years since I heard it."

"Anyway - pardon me asking, but you're living alone at the moment, aren't you?"

"That's right. Have been ever since my marriage broke up. Haven't held down a relationship since then."

"Because of - all this?"

"Partly. Potential boyfriends don't like my devotion to work, and my fingers were burned by the breakup." She grimaced. "We were both too young. I was only twenty, and I liked the idea of being looked after. Big mistake. He was as idealistic and as gormless as I was. Luckily it took us only five months to work that out and agree to call it a day. Before there were any children to complicate the issue. My Dad walked out when I was six months old, so I know what _that_ can be like for the sprogs."

"I thought so. I - look, will you let me invite you home to dinner? Allie'll be glad to meet you, she knows most of the team, and she does a mean Lancashire hotpot. Just so long as you don't mind three kids around your ankles the minute you step into the house..." The words tumbled out in an embarrassed rush, then he fell silent for a moment. "I just don't think you should be alone this evening."

She heard the urgency in those last words as she looked into the hazel eyes. She knew that there was nothing improper in his invitation. The Guv was well known to be a devoted family man. That was why he had been so incensed by Layton's insinuations that morning. Most of the team had visited him at some time or other. She had thought that, when she had achieved her goal at last, she would want some time alone. But what would she do, in her small flat all evening? Cry? Blame herself all over again for what she had done as a child of twelve? _Probably drink myself senseless. _She had been solitary for so long that she was touched to find someone so concerned for her.

"Thank you, Guv. I'd love to come."

The smallest of smiles graced his lips. "Good. That's settled. I'll go and have a word with the team now, then you go and wash your face and I'll get Carter to make you some tea. Then I want you to have a look at the statements on the Borough Market muggings. I'm sure there's a connection there, and you're the one to pick it out for me."

"Oh, but, Guv - "

He shook his head slightly. "No, Molly. No more Layton. That's finished for you."

**TBC**


	3. Lion and Cubs

**Disclaimer: BBC, Kudos and Monastic own Ashes to Ashes and all the characters. However I claim responsibility for DCI Sam Hunt and his family, and his team except for Molly.**

**Renewed thanks to everyone who's reading this and especially to those who are reviewing. It means so much to know whether what I'm doing is working or not.**

**The trouble with writing something like this while Series 2 is still running, is the chance that it could go out of date before I finish posting. I've gone back and made one small amendment to Chapter 2 in the light of new information in Episode 5 on Molly's father, but by and large please remember that this story is a sequel to one written before Series 2 started, and therefore doesn't always take Series 2 into account.**

**On we go...**

By the time she had pulled herself together, washed her face and drunk some tea, she only had about half an hour on the Borough Market statements before the team started to disperse for the evening. Not wanting the rest of the team to think she was "going out with the Guv", she pegged on with the statements until the office was nearly empty and the Guv was standing over her, jingling his car keys with a meaningful air.

"Sorry, Guv, no connection yet."

"Come back to it tomorrow when your brain's fresher. You've had one hell of a day, and it isn't over yet. You've still got the junior Hunts to face. I rang Allie earlier, so she's expecting you. Come on, log off and we'll be on our way."

"Yes, Guv," she said meekly.

Five minutes later the Nissan was powering through the rush hour traffic. Knowing that the Guv didn't like to be disturbed while he was driving, she kept quiet. It felt unfamiliar, and rather exciting, to be beside him in the front seat, which was Bill's place until the new DI arrived - usually she was bundled in the back with Frank - and as she gazed out over the broad bonnet to the road beyond, she suddenly felt grateful that she was being chauffered by the Guv and not by his famous father, whose reckless driving was nearly as much of a legend as his unorthodox but brilliant policing. She had never met the great Gene Hunt - he had retired abroad while she was still a child - and the Guv took care not to mention him too much, but despite their dramatically divergent views on law enforcement it was clear that he worshipped the man. There was scarcely a copper who did not. In his time, he had been regarded as a reactionary dinosaur, but now he was revered as a "real copper's copper". From what she knew of him, she suspected that he would have appreciated the epitaph.

She wondered what it had been like for the Guv, growing up in the shadow of such a formidable figure. Rather like it had been for her, she mused, with the constant feeling that she had to live up to the memory of her mother, in her case coupled with the burning need to hone herself to take revenge on her mother's murderer. Yet the Guv had become very much his own man. Perhaps he was right, and now was the time for her start again. _Become my own person at last. But I know it'll be hard after all this time. There will always be the sense of guilt that I've gone beyond Mum's death. Even if it is_ _what she'd have wanted._

Her thoughts were broken into as the car drew up outside a substantial semi-detached house with a well-kept front garden.

"Well, here we are," said the Guv, undoing his seatbelt. "Prepare to enter the lions' den."

Molly smiled. "Your father was known as the Manc Lion, wasn't he?"

Hunt smiled back. "That's right. That's why I was known as the Cub when I first joined the force. Now I've got cubs of my own. Just in case the little buggers move so fast you can't count them, I'll brief you. There _are_ only three of them, though it can look like more. The eldest is Phil, he's six, then Ella's four and Kirsty's two. She's the one who'll use me for a climbing pole as soon as she spots me. Ready to face 'em?"

Molly undid her seatbelt. "Yup."

Just as the Guv had prophesied, as soon as he opened the door and roared "I'm home!", the children erupted from the living room and hurled themselves at their father, clinging to his legs with shrieks of "Daddy!"

"Hey, hey, where's your manners?" he grinned, unsuccessfully trying to look severe. "I bring a visitor home and she must think this place is Arsenal Stadium! Meet Molly, all of you. She works with me."

A small, dark, gracefully lovely young woman emerged from the kitchen. A greater contrast with her tall, golden husband could scarcely be imagined. "Supper will be ready in ten minutes, love."

Molly, who had been holding back, came forward and solemnly shook hands with Phil, who was his father all over again, except that his eyes were fiercely blue; Ella, small and dark like her mother; Kirsty, a bubbly blonde who was clearly destined to be a heartbreaker; and Allie, who greeted her warmly but shyly and vanished back into the kitchen.

"Ten minutes," Hunt beamed at the kids. "Time for a game before supper? What do you say, Molly?"

All eyes turned to her, and she took her cue from him. "Why not?"

"What'll it be then?" Hunt demanded of the kids.

"LION!" they all shrieked.

Hunt chuckled. "Ready, Molly? This is a rough one - " He dropped to his knees, shook his blond locks over his face and charged at the kids on all fours, snarling and growling. They scattered, but he effortlessly herded them into the living room, and somehow Molly was swept along with them. In no time at all she found herself climbing onto the sofa to take refuge, shrieking with laughter, while Kirsty tried to climb onto her head and Hunt pursued the other two around the room.

"Let me ride you, Daddy!" Kirsty crowed, and Hunt stopped and looked up.

"Put her on my back, Molly! She's the Lady of the Lion!"

Molly cautiously lifted the squirming two-year-old, feeling a sudden pang at the feeling of the young, warm life she held, and carefully placed her astride her father's back. She never could have imagined that she would see her revered Guv, in his smart work suit, crawling around the floor with Kirsty bouncing on his back and kicking her heels into his sides. Fortunately for him, it was only a few minutes before Allie came in, announced that supper was ready, and whisked the kids away.

Hunt flopped over on his back with a silent "phew!", pushed the hair off his face, and rolled his eyes up at Molly, who was still crouched on the sofa, breathless with laughter.

"I am _definitely_ getting too old for this sort of thing," he announced solemnly.

"I wouldn't say that, Guv," Molly panted, trying to restore her hair to something like normality.

He eyed her narrowly. "No, you wouldn't. You've got your eye on your next staff appraisal. But if you so much as _think_ of mentioning any of this at work, you'll be back in uniform before you can change your lip gloss!"

"Deal, Guv," she laughed.

"You didn't even pull your weight," he grumbled as she helped him to his feet. "Stayed on the sofa and left Ella and Phil to do the legwork."

"I can run faster than them, and you wouldn't have been able to get me with them in the way. And I _did_ have Kirsty climbing all over me," she added defensively.

"Point taken," he chuckled. "Feeding time. Follow me."

Supper was not quite as riotous as she might have expected to be. The children had clearly been well trained in table manners and she guessed that Allie had warned them to be on their best behaviour in front of a visitor. But there was plenty of happy chatter, with a number of excited questions about her police work and whether she had ever met any _real _ criminals. Molly fended them off as best she could, and seeing that she wanted to avoid the subject, Hunt expertly steered the conversation to other topics. Allie's Lancashire hotpot was sublime, and when Molly complimented her on her cooking, she laughed, "It's in the blood, Sam's dad and mine both being Manchester men. I'd be disowned if I couldn't make this!"

After the meal, Molly offered to help clear up and wash up, but Allie would not hear of it, and insisted that Molly should relax and make herself at home. After clearing the table and stacking the dishwasher, Allie swept the children upstairs for bath and bed, leaving Hunt and Molly in a living room which suddenly seemed very quiet and empty.

Pouring out wine for himself and Molly, and sitting beside her on the sofa, Hunt cocked his ear at the sound of various shrieks and crashes resounding from upstairs.

"It'll sound like Armageddon up there until she gets 'em off to sleep," he chuckled. "She was a teaching assistant until the kids started to come along, so she's used to multiple kids all day long. I'd rather arrest an armed blagger than take on all 'em together on my own at bathtime - and there'll be a Number Four along in seven months, God willing."

"How wonderful," said Molly sincerely. "I'm so pleased for you both, Guv."

There was a distant look in his eyes. "If it's a boy this time, we're going to call him Gene."

"Another Gene Hunt?" Molly smiled as she sipped her wine.

"Yeah. When Phil was born, Allie and I thought one Gene Hunt at a time was as much as the world could stand. Since Dad died, we found out that he'd hoped that we'd name our first son after him. Wish we'd known that. Mum told us that when one of his ex-girlfriends turned up pregnant and he thought he was responsible, he wanted her to name her kid after him. We want to put that right now."

"You miss him a lot, don't you, Guv?"

He nodded. "Yes. Yes, I do. More than I can say. I suppose every Dad's a hero to his kids, but he was so much larger than life in every way. And - look, I'm Sam while we're off duty and the kids are out of the way, OK?"

"OK, G - Sam."

There was a companionable silence, punctuated by the occasional noise from upstairs. Molly settled into the sofa and let fatigue, laughter, the meal and the wine do their work. She realised suddenly that she had not thought about her mother for over an hour. At once she felt a pang of guilt, quickly followed by the realisation that this was what Sam had intended. _To take me out of myself._

"Thank you so much for inviting me here this evening, G - Sam. It isn't at all what I'd expected to do after I'd got him at last, but I'm really enjoying it."

"Good. That was the idea," he replied, deadpan. He looked across at her, and his voice became gentler. "I've been worried about you, Molly. I know you won't have noticed. You've been so intense, so driven. All the rest of us have something out of work - a family like mine, boyfriend or girlfriend, favourite football team, garden, pop group, _something_ - but you've been so focused on your work that you haven't been able to think about anything else. Even when you've joined the rest of us for a jar after work, you've been so closed up in your job that you haven't been able to stop talking shop. I thought you were just young and ambitious and eager to prove yourself. 'Course, I know better now." He looked at her very seriously. "I had a number of reasons for bringing you here tonight. The first was to make sure that you didn't end up alone in your flat, full of regrets for the past and drunk as a bottle of beer. The second was to show you _one_ form of life beyond work. Marriage and a houseful of kids may never be what you want, but when you eventually decide what to do with your life now, it's just one of the countless options available to you."

_A normal life. How normal has mine ever been? My father left when I was six months old, my mother was murdered when I was twelve._

"Promise me you'll think about starting again, Molly." The deep voice was quiet, but very compelling. "You owe it to yourself."

Molly nodded slowly. "I know. It's still early days yet. But now he's under arrest, at least I've got some sort of closure."

"Good."

"But when things have settled down a bit, I'll remember what you've said. I do promise you that."

"Good. One more thing. Just because your marriage turned out badly, doesn't mean that every relationship you'll ever have will be crap. When my parents got married, it was second time around for both of them, and they both had very ugly divorces behind them, but they remained almost ridiculously in love all their lives. Hell, it was embarrassing for a growing boy, just to see the way they kept looking at each other. But it was very comforting too. The world felt a safe place, knowing how strong they were together. Doesn't mean it was all plain sailing, though. They were both very strong-willed people, and when they argued, you could hear them miles away. They did try to keep that element of their relationship away from us kids, but it must have been hell for their colleagues. Uncle Chris says it was like working on a missile testing range. You never knew which was going to explode first." He chuckled at the memory.

"Sorry, who said?"

"Allie's dad. My godfather."

Molly put her glass down, leaned forward with her elbows on her knees, and clasped her hands, deep in thought.

"If I'm going to be really honest with myself, since the divorce I've been using the demands of my work as a shield. To keep me focused on what I had to do for Mum, and to keep me from getting hurt again."

"It isn't always easy, keeping a normal life outside this job," Sam agreed. "Not everyone's prepared to accept it. Allie knew what she was doing when she took me on. We both come from copper families."

"Really?"

"Yes. You probably know, Dad rose to DCI in Manchester. After his divorce in 1980 he transferred to London. Uncle Chris, who was his DC, transferred with him, along with the DS. The DI had died in an accident a few months previously. Dad had been devastated by that, they were close friends. Anyway, when the three of them got to London, Auntie Shaz, that's Allie's mum, was the WPC assigned to the team, and she and Uncle Chris fell for each other like a ton of bricks. Mum joined the team as DI the following year. She and Dad were attracted to each other straight away, but they were both too proud and too stubborn to admit it. Professionally they were at daggers drawn, she was always very forward-looking and he was something of a reactionary. Then the team were involved in a drive-by shooting. Mum was hit in the head and went into a coma. Dad almost went out of his mind. He sat by her bedside for days, talking to her, trying to bring her round. After six days, she woke up and found him watching over her. They never looked back after that. They were married the following year, shortly after Uncle Chris and Auntie Shaz. Allie's parents left the team when they got promoted, of course - they both retired as DCIs - but the two families remained close. They were godparents to each others' kids, and we all grew up together. Allie was named after Mum. She and I were childhood sweethearts. She decided what she wanted very early in life."

"Who did?" said Allie, coming into the room.

"You did," Sam smiled, rising from the sofa to put an arm around her and kiss her cheek. "You wanted me, and you got me."

She laughed and returned the kiss. "So I did, you old ruffian. The Skeltons always were a determined family."

He helped her lower herself carefully into an armchair, and poured her a glass of orange juice. "Back playing up, love?"

"It just catches me once in a while, like it did when I was having Ella. No problem. All kids safely stowed away for the night," Allie laughed.

"Sorry I didn't help you with 'em tonight," he said apologetically. "There was a lot I needed to explain to Molly here. And now Allie's come back," he added, turning to Molly, "I can explain the third reason why I invited you here tonight. You see, Allie," he turned back to his wife, "Molly was instrumental today in arresting a very old enemy of all of us. Arthur Layton."

"Really?!" Allie put her glass down and clapped her hands with delight. "After all these years! Oh, Mum and Dad will be so pleased! Can I ring and let them know?" She was already levering herself to her feet, but Sam gestured to her to stay where she was.

"In a few minutes, love, if you don't mind. We owe Molly a few explanations first. You see, her family have old history with Layton too. Her mother was the cop he murdered twelve years ago."

"Oh, my dear, I'm so sorry - " Instantly Allie was out of her chair and crossing the room to sit beside Molly, putting an arm around her. Once again, after having spent so long alone, Molly felt deeply moved that someone she scarcely knew should be so concerned for her.

"I told you earlier today that Layton's arrest in 1981 was a family affair," Sam went on. "It was when Mum had just joined the team. Dad was trying to crack a big drug ring. The kingpin appeared to be a seriously nasty yuppie named Edward Markham."

"Nine Toed Eddie?" said Molly, surprised.

"That's him, but he had ten toes in those days. There didn't appear to be any connection between him and Layton, who was on police radar as a tinker with a minor record. He had a junk yard in Shadwell which he'd used in the past to fence stolen goods. But Mum always seemed to have an instinct for trouble where Layton was concerned. She fingered that he was the kingpin of the drugs operation and was using Markham as his front man. She stole a notebook from his yard which had details of tide times, and she knew he kept boats. She and Dad realised that Layton was bringing in his drugs by river. She sent Uncle Chris and Auntie Shaz undercover to watch for a message pickup between Markham and Layton, and Markham's heavies kidnapped Auntie Shaz. The whole team raced down to the river to rescue her and intercept the shipment. And there was Layton in all his filthy glory, the drug dealer in his smart suit and gold chain. Uncle Chris went ballistic and opened fire too early, and it turned into a big shoot-out. Layton grabbed Auntie Shaz as hostage. Dad shot out his car engine, so Layton tried to get away with her on foot, and Mum gave chase. Meanwhile Dad and the others got hold of Layton's motor boat and came sweeping to the rescue. Imagine the boat bouncing over the water with the three of them in it, guns in hand, with Tower Bridge in the background!" He laughed, and Molly and Allie laughed with him. "It must have looked like something out of a film. Mum and Layton were in a standoff, with her holding him at gunpoint and him threatening Auntie Shaz. Dad and the others opened fire and brought him down. Markham ran for it, carrying armloads of cocaine, but Uncle Chris caught him, and - well, he later claimed that the bastard was trying to resist arrest - he shot his toe off."

"He did _what_?" said Molly, incredulous.

"His own little revenge for Auntie Shaz. Police could get away with a lot more in those days. Markham's been known as Nine Toed Eddie in this family ever since. He went to trial and got ten years. As you know, they weren't so lucky with Layton. His lawyer got him off on a technicality while he was in custody awaiting trial."

"I know," said Molly bitterly. "My grandfather. Later that day, he and Gran were blown up in their car. We've always suspected that Layton was behind that."

"I know," Sam said quietly. "You told me this morning. I didn't make the connection at first. Mum would be ashamed of me. What you don't know is who rescued your mother from the blast."

"Wasn't it Evan?" said Molly, surprised. "Mum always thought so."

"No. My father."

_"What?"_ said Molly and Allie together.

"Mum had received a series of phone calls with information about the attack. At least one came from Layton, she wasn't sure about the others. None were recorded. She tried to warn your grandparents to lie low for a time, but they laughed it off. Dad had other things on his mind, Lord Scarman was visiting the station at the time. Eventually, with the time of the blast drawing near, Mum persuaded him to make one last attempt to warn your grandparents. They raced across London but weren't in time to prevent the explosion. As you know, your mother, a child of eight, had got out of the car just before the blast. Dad shielded her from the flames, carried her back to his car, and took her back to the station. Her guardian collected her there later."

"Evan."

"Yes, though I didn't remember his name from what Mum told me about the incident. Remiss of me."

Molly gazed at him in wonder. "Your father. All these years, and she didn't know. I've worked for you for over a year, and _I_ didn't know."

"I told you, our families go back a long way."

"She remembered a tall man in a black coat," Molly mused. "That was why she thought it was Evan."

"Dad wore a big black overcoat at that time," said Sam. "Mum said it was vanity, showed off his fair hair well. He looked a lot like me, though I can say with pardonable pride that he could give me a couple of stone when he was my age." He rose, strolled over to a wall unit behind the sofa, and returned with a large framed photograph. "This was taken a couple of years later. It's good of him, of all four parents actually. My christening. Dad on the left, _without_ the overcoat, Uncle Chris and Auntie Shaz - godparents - on the right, Mum in the middle holding the baby. What a prat I do look in that christening robe. Satin and lace are so not _me._"

"I don't think you can be held responsible for your dress sense at two months old," Allie teased.

Molly took the photograph, looked at it, and felt the ground shift beneath her. She dimly registered the tall, broad, golden-haired, blue-eyed man who was the image of Sam at the left of the picture, and the couple at the right, a dark, elfin girl very like Allie and a pleasant-faced young man with gold highlights in his dark hair. But in truth she could see nothing but the woman at the centre with the child in her arms, who smiled to her across the years, her beauty imperishable.

"Wh-when was this picture taken?" she gulped.

"Year I was born. 1983."

"But that's my mother. That's my _mother_." The photograph fell from her hand and she collapsed in a dead faint.

**TBC**


	4. The Woman in the Picture

**Disclaimer: I don't own Ashes to Ashes or the characters. All I own are my ideas and the characters I invented for this fic.**

**Once again, thank you to everyone for all the wonderful reviews, favouriting, story alerting and feedback (including the lively debate on the Railway Arms, thanks ladies). Please keep it coming. I'm out of the country for five days next week (I'll miss Episode 6, alas! - thank Heaven for the iPlayer), so I won't be able to reply to reviews until next weekend, but I promise I will reply!**

**N.B. Some of the timings quoted in this chapter don't reflect what we now know happens in 1982 in Series 2. This is because it reflects the timing of "Decision Time", which was set in late 1981, shortly after the end of Series 1. **

**There has been a lot of discussion about the date of Molly's birthday. For my theory – which I follow here – see my afterword to Chapter 11 of "Stravagation". **

"Molly? Molly? Wake up, it's all right, love..."

She dimly heard the voice penetrating her consciousness. "Mum?"

"No, it's me, Allie. Don't worry, you're okay."

With difficulty, she opened her eyes and found Allie bending over her, bathing her forehead. _What strange eyes she has_, she thought inconsequentially, _one blue and one green. _

"Feeling better now?"

"Yes - I think so..." She tried to sit up, but Allie gently pushed her back down.

"Whoa, whoa. You've been out cold for a couple of minutes. Take it slowly."

With Sam and Allie supporting her on either side, she managed to sit upright.

"Drink this." Sam pushed a glass of brandy into her hand. She obediently sipped it, spluttering over the fiery liquid but welcoming the warmth it gave her. As full consciousness returned, she felt a flood of shame and embarrassment. What on earth would her DCI think of her now? He had invited her into his home, made her welcome, trusted her with his children, and in return she had offered him what he must see as an unforgivable insult. She held the glass out blindly, and Allie took it and set it down.

"Oh, God, I'm sorry, sorry, so sorry," she muttered, burying her face in her hands. "You must think I'm mad."

"Of course we don't," said Allie soothingly. "You've had a bad day. Sam said so when he phoned me to say you were coming."

"No, no, I wasn't hallucinating." Suddenly it was very important that they should know why she had said it. "Look, I can show you - " Allie tried to calm her, but weak and wild, she reached for her handbag on the sofa beside her, rummaged for her wallet, and pulled out a crumpled snapshot. "Evan took this, the Christmas before my mother died."

Sam and Allie leaned over from either side to look at it. It showed Molly, a mousey child of eleven, her hair tied back, pulling a cracker with a beautiful woman. Both were smiling at the camera.

"Good _heavens_," Allie breathed. Sam said nothing and his face was impassive, but he took the photo from Molly's hand and studied it intently. The woman in Molly's photo had straight hair, drawn back and clipped up, and she wore no makeup. His mother's hair was cut in a fringe and flowed loose, and she wore the heavy makeup common in the 1980s. But it was the same face, the very same. He picked up the photo of his christening and held the two side by side in front of Molly.

"Doesn't look like you're mad to me," he said levelly.

"But they can't be the same," said Molly almost desperately. "They look the same age, but the photos were taken twenty-four years apart."

"Is it possible that you two are related?" said Allie confusedly. "Distant cousins, maybe?"

"I don't see how," said Molly wearily. "I'm an only child. So was my mother, so were her parents. That was why there were no relatives around who could take her on after her parents died. I'm sorry, so sorry. God knows what you must think of me. I should go - "

"No, Mols. I'd like you to stay, if you will." She had expected Sam to sound icy, furious, but his voice was as gentle as it had been when he was comforting her that afternoon. "I think the three of us should talk."

"What about?" said Molly almost pleadingly.

"We're detectives, and this needs investigating. Agreed?" Molly nodded wordlessly. "Let's start with names. My mother's name, before she married my father, was Detective Inspector Alexandra Caroline Drake. But she was always called Alex." He looked full at her as he said it.

"My God," Molly whispered.

"She was my godmother," Allie put in. "I was named after her. But two Alexes in the extended family was just too confusing, so I became Allie - Are you all right, Molly?"

"That was my mother's name, too," said Molly faintly. Allie took her hand, gripping it hard, and looked across at her husband.

"I learned today for the first time that your mother's name was Alexandra Drake," said Sam gravely. "You've just added the Caroline. Your own second name. And we discovered earlier that both our maternal grandmothers were called Caroline too."

"And both our mothers were shot in the head and went into comas," said Molly, almost unwillingly. "But mine died, and yours lived."

"Mum was left with a bullet scar on her temple, just here." Sam gestured to his forehead. "You can't see it in the photo. She grew the fringe to cover it. But you can see it here. This is their wedding." He went over to the unit behind the sofa and returned with a large album. He sat beside Molly, opened the album, and opened it at a large photo, showing his mother in an exquisite white satin gown of Victorian cut, with a low, square neck. She held a bouquet of white lilac and her hair was swept up under a gauzy veil, crowned with silver flowers. The white scar was clearly visible on her forehead. She was leaning on the arm of the tall, golden man, who looked magnificent in a black frock coat and grey topper. They both seemed ablaze with happiness.

"That's where my mother was shot," said Molly, very low. "They said I shouldn't see her again after she died, but I wanted to see her just once more without all the bandages and tubes, to remember her like that. So Evan let me. She looked so peaceful. There was just a bullet hole - here." She pointed to the same place on her forehead and there were tears in her eyes.

Sam laid the album aside. "How old was your mother when she died?" he said gently.

"Thirty-five."

"My mother was thirty-five when she came out of nowhere to join my father's team in 1981. No family, no friends, no home, no money, seemingly no _past_, only the clothes on her back and the warrant card in her pocket. And the clothes weren't much use. She was working undercover disguised as a tart. Dad used to say that she staggered into his life in six-inch heels and a two-inch skirt. That was all she had to wear until Auntie Shaz found her something else."

In spite of herself, Molly smiled.

"Even when she got married, there wasn't a single member of her family there," Sam went on. "The only relative she ever mentioned was a daughter whom she'd had to leave behind her. In the first months with the team she spoke a lot about wanting to go home to her daughter, but after the shooting she never mentioned her again. She always became upset if Dad asked her about it, so after a time he didn't ask her. He thought that the daughter must have died. But it may not have been that."

"Did - did she ever mention her daughter's name?" Molly felt as though she was in some crazy dream world, with reality and logic slipping away from her. One glance at Allie's face showed that she felt the same. But Sam was still sober, composed and thoughtful.

"I'm afraid she didn't, no."

A completely irrational hope blossomed inside her. "And is she - " She could not bring herself to say the words. "Can I ask her? Is she still alive?"

"I'm afraid not, love." Sam took her other hand and held it tight. "She died two years ago."

Her throat closed up with disappointment. She could hardly speak. "H-how did it happen?"

Sam sighed and looked at her sadly. "Dad retired as Superintendent at 65, in 2001. Mum was ten years his junior, so she kept working until Carrie and I flew the nest - Carrie's my sister, born a year after me. She's in banking. Married to a stockbroker and lives in Essex. It had always been Dad's dream to retire to a villa in Spain. I think Mum would have preferred to stay over here, but she never said anything. Wherever he was, she had to be. They'd invested wisely since their marriage - Mum always had an eye for a good investment - so after they sold their house in London following her retirement, they had enough money for it. They flew out to Spain in 2005. I'd just started with the Met, I think Dad thought that things would be easier for me if he wasn't there to overshadow me. He was probably right, at that. They got themselves a lovely little place in Alicante, and whenever either of us visited them we could see they were blissfully happy. Nobody thought Dad would live long enough to enjoy a long retirement, he'd drunk enough whisky in his time to float the _Titanic_ and smoked enough fags to tarmac the M25. It was Mum who kept him young. He was fit as a flea, right up till the moment when he keeled over on the golf course at the age of 82. Massive heart attack, he can't have felt a thing. He'd just got a hole in one. Hell of a way to go. Carrie and I dropped everything to go out there and help Mum. I'll never forget how she was when we found her. She was just like a ghost. She kept saying, "I only came back for him. Now he's gone, there's nothing left." We tried to tell that of course there was plenty left, there was us and our kids, her friends. All the usual things one says to grieving widows, and Christ knows we get enough of that in our job. But deep down, I knew what she meant. Carrie and I had our own lives. She and Dad had been two halves of a whole."

"Came back? From where?" said Molly, frowning.

"That she didn't say. I thought that she was talking about when she came round from her coma. She'd always said that she'd heard his voice and came back to him. Anyway, he'd wanted to be buried in this country, so Carrie and I helped Mum make all the arrangements. After the funeral, she told us that she didn't want to go back to Spain. Couldn't bear to live alone in the house they'd shared for so long. So Carrie and I took leave of absence from our jobs and we flew out there to pack up what she wanted to take and arrange for the place to be rented out until we could sell it. We both offered that she could stay with us as long as she wanted, but she'd always been very independent and insisted that she wanted her own place. We found her a small furnished flat near here, close enough for Allie or me to look in every day, until we could get her something permanent. But we all knew that she wouldn't need it for very long. Physically she was still very fit, but - well, you've heard of people dying of a broken heart, and we saw it happen. She just faded away and there was nothing we could do to stop it. It was as though she didn't want to live in a world that didn't have him in it. She survived him by less than five months." He looked away, and Allie reached behind Molly to lay a hand on his shoulder.

"I'm sorry," said Molly softly, for the first time that evening feeling sorrow for someone other than herself. "I shouldn't have asked you."

"Yes, you should," he said gruffly. "You remember your mother as a brilliant Mum and a wonderful, brave woman. Just as I do my mother. We mustn't stop thinking about them, just because it hurts."

"No," Molly whispered. "But - "

"But what?"

"Now I can never ask her. I'll never know."

He looked at her very intently, started to say something, and hesitated. The two women watched as he silently came to a decision. "Wait there." He patted Molly's hand, rose, and walked into the next room. For a few minutes they heard him rummaging and cursing. Molly looked inquiringly at Allie, who raised her eyebrows and shrugged.

"That's his study," she whispered. "He uses it to work from home. But, no, I don't know what he's looking for."

Almost at once he returned with a long white envelope and a paperknife in his hand. He sat down beside Molly again, took a deep breath, and began to speak.

"A couple of months before Mum died, she asked to see me. I called round that day after work, like I did most days. When I arrived, I let myself in - I had a key - and found her sitting at her desk, writing. She asked me to wait a minute, so I went and made us some tea. When I came back with it, she was folding some sheets of paper into an envelope, and I could see that she'd been crying. We sat down together, and she said, "I want you to promise to do something for me." Of course I said, "Sure, Mum, anything." But I'll never forget what she said next. "Before I tell you what it is, you must promise that, whatever happens, whatever you might hear in the future, you will always remember that, since I came round from that coma in 1981 and found your father watching over me, I have never, ever so much as thought about any other man." Well, that went without saying. I've already told you, they were almost ridiculously in love. I couldn't imagine why she thought that I would think anything else. But she looked so very serious that I said, "Yes, Mum, I promise I will." Then she gave me the envelope - this envelope - and said, "There's someone whom I've wanted to contact for a long time. I want you to promise that, if you ever meet her after I'm gone, and you think that it is right that you should do so, you will give her this. You will have to make that decision for me." Of course, I promised I would, but I asked her why she didn't try and find this person herself. She looked very sad, and said, "No, I can't. It wouldn't be right. If ever you find her, you'll probably find out why. I'm not asking you to spend the rest of your life looking for her, because you'll probably never find her, but you come across so many people in the course of your job that you might just meet her. If ever you do, promise me that you'll be her guardian angel and treat her just like another sister." I hadn't a clue what she was talking about by that time - Mum had that effect on people - but I promised her solemnly that I would, and I asked her who this person was. She said, "I haven't heard of her for many years, so I don't know if she still lives in this country, or if her name is still the same. She may have married by now. All I can tell you is that when I knew her, her name was Molly Drake, and that she was born on the seventh of February, 1996." "

"My God..." Allie breathed. Molly was completely unable to speak.

"Exactly," said Sam gravely. "I knew that Mum's surname was Drake before she married Dad, so I'd assumed - wrongly, as it turns out - that the letter was for a member of her first husband's family, perhaps a niece. You've been working for me for over a year, but up till today I knew you only as Caroline Weston. Today you told me that you were born Molly Drake, and that your mother's name was Alexandra, called Alex. I looked up your personnel record. Date of birth, seventh of February, 1996."

Molly nodded dumbly.

"That's the final reason why I invited you here tonight. I'll admit that I showed you Mum's photo to see if you'd react." Sam shook his head in bewilderment. "How this all fits together I still don't know, but maybe Mum's letter will give us some answers." He held the envelope out to her. "I think this is for you."

Molly's hands were shaking so much that she could scarcely take the envelope. Sam gently took her wrist and held her hand steady so that he could slip the envelope into it.

"Would you like us to leave while you read it?" he said quietly.

"No. No. I'd like you both to stay, if you will. Please." He nodded, put the paperknife on the coffee table in front of her, rose, picked up his wine glass, and strolled over to an armchair. Allie followed him and settled herself in the armchair, and he perched on the arm, his arm around her, sipping his wine, waiting until they were needed.

Molly sat there for a few moments, holding the envelope in her hands, and took several deep breaths to calm herself. Only then did she dare to look at what she held. The envelope was addressed to _Molly Drake_.

"That's Mum's handwriting," she said unsteadily. "I'm _sure_ it is." Neither Sam nor Allie said anything. She picked up the paperknife, carefully slit the envelope, reached inside, and removed two folded sheets of paper, covered in handwriting, and a snapshot of Sam's mother, wearing a white leather jacket, low-necked pink top, and figure-hugging jeans. Her hair was a mass of permed curls. She stood, facing the camera, her hands on her hips, smiling confidently, luxuriating in her beauty. With an effort, Molly turned the photo over. On the back, in a hand she did not know, was written _The Boss. July 1981_.

"Who called her the Boss? Your father?"

"Perish the thought." Sam smiled briefly, despite the solemnity of the situation. "But Uncle Chris did." Molly held the photo out to him, and he rose from his perch, took it, and showed it to Allie.

"Dad took that," Allie said. "There's a copy in his album, I've seen it. And that's his writing."

Sam returned the photo to Molly and sat down beside Allie again. With shaking fingers, Molly unfolded the letter and began to read.

**TBC**


	5. Letter from the Past

**Disclaimer: I don't own Ashes to Ashes or any of its characters. Just my ideas and the characters I invented for this fic.**

**Once again, thank you to everyone who's read and reviewed to date. Please keep the feedback coming in! **

**I am SO relieved that I posted Chapter 4 before Episode 6 was aired, with Alex leaving letters for the team. Great minds think alike. I just wonder how much of what I'm writing is set to be disproved by the next two episodes... **

"And I'll leave behind my Molly

She's the girl that I adore

And I wonder if she'll think of me..."

_- _John Tams,_ The Scarlet and the Blue - _From _War Horse, _play adapted by Nick Stafford from the novel by Michael Morpurgo

------

_7 February 1983_

_My own darling Molly, _

_I don't know if you will ever receive this letter, and yet I feel that I must write it. If you do, it will be many years from now. I must tell you at the start that I am going to ask you to believe one impossible thing. If you can do that for me, then everything else I am going to say will fall into place. If you can't, then this letter could cause you a lot of pain, and you should stop reading, now. But if you love me and trust me enough to believe and accept what I am going to say, then please keep reading. _

_I know how you and Evan watched over me in hospital, as I lay in a coma after Arthur Layton shot me. But what you don't know, my darling, is that Layton's bullet sent me back in time to 1981, to just before when Gran and Grandad were killed. I have been living in the 1980s ever since, working as a police officer with the Met. That is the impossible thing that I am asking you to believe._

_I tried so hard to get back home to you, to wake up from my coma. I was utterly determined that I was not going to die. I vowed with everything in me, that I'd never stop fighting to see you again. I spent months in the 1980s, trying to take control of my destiny so that I could return to you in the future. I just would not give up. But nothing worked. I think, now, that it must have been because I was not strong enough in 2008. That if I had recovered consciousness, I would have died._

_Then I was shot again, in 1981, and I went into a coma there as well. It was a revenge attack from a criminal we'd put away. That second bullet sent me to a place between my past and my future, where I was told that I had to choose between my two lives. I would wake up in one life and make a full recovery, but I would lose the other life for ever. Of course, I instantly said that I wanted to go home to you. But I was told that, before I made my final decision, I had to see what would happen in both times, depending upon when I lived and when I died. _

_What I was shown then, changed both of our lives for ever. I learned that, if I came home to you, then two years later we would both be in an appalling car crash. You would be killed, and I would be left paralysed from the neck down, despairing, longing for death but unable to die, trapped in a hateful, useless existence. While back in the 1980s, a good man about whom I had come to care very much, and to whom I owe my life, would also die a terrible death because I was not there to prevent it. But if I died in 2008, you would live past the day of the crash in 2010 because you would be living with Daddy, and he would take you to school by a different route. You would have the chance to grow up, to grow old. I would have an active, useful life in the 1980s. The man I love would also live, and we might have a chance of happiness together._

_I realised then, that the only way to save your life, to save all three of us, was to give up all hope of ever seeing you again. But even then, it was the hardest decision I have ever had to make. I want you to know that, Molly. I didn't make my choice lightly, and I didn't do it because there was someone waiting for me in 1981. I didn't choose him over you. I did it because I knew that, if I went back to you, two years later your broken little body would be cut out of the wreckage of my car and hoisted onto a hospital gurney, and I would recover consciousness in hospital after the accident, to be told that your neck had broken when the car crashed. I had to put your life and your future before my desire to see you again, and that decison all but broke my heart. I couldn't even say goodbye to you. All I could do was watch you sitting by my bed as I died in 2008, before you faded from my sight forever. But I knew, and I know still, that you will survive this terrible loss, just as I did. I know how strong and clever and brave you are, and that the world will be yours for the taking._

_Do you remember that, when I was driving you to school on the day I was shot, you were reading a confidential file about a man called Sam Tyler? He had been in a prolonged deep coma, during which he believed that he had travelled back in time to 1973, to work for the Greater Manchester Police. His boss in 1973 was a man called Gene Hunt. When Sam recovered consciousness, he made reports and tapes about his experiences, which he sent to me. He died shortly afterwards. When I went to 1981, I found myself working in Gene Hunt's team. Sam had gone back to them after his death in 2007, and he had died there in 1980. The rest of the team had subsequently transferred to the Met. From what I had heard from Sam, I expected Gene Hunt to be an arrogant, violent, sexist bastard, whose ideas of policing were out of date even in 1981. I found him to be all that, and much, much more. Under enough thick skin for a herd of elephants, I found a strong, vulnerable, proud, damaged, flawed, lonely man, a good, brave, decent, kind, caring, compassionate man who has guarded me ever since I came here. Deep down I knew that we loved each other, but I would not admit it, even to myself. I was so determined to get home to you and I didn't want anything to stand in my way. But when I returned to 1981, knowing that I will be here for the rest of my life, I awakened in hospital to find Gene watching over me. He had been there all the time since I had been admitted, talking to me, trying to arouse me from my coma. I knew then that, although I have lost you forever, my home now is with him. That wherever he is, I am meant to be._

_We have been married for six months. I am so happy here with him, happier than anyone has any right to be, but I have one great sadness that he must never know - that I will never see you or hear you again, never hold you in my arms, never know how you will grow up or what you will become. Above all, that I could not tell you why I had to leave you to live here, and that I will always feel terrible guilt at having left you, even though it was the only thing I could have done. I have had to accept that, and accept how fortunate I am, to have been allowed this second chance of life with this infuriating, impossible, glorious man by my side. I have just learned that I am carrying his child, and that knowledge has made me decide to write this letter, on the day which will be your birthday in thirteen years' time. I hope that, by writing down everything I long to be able to tell you but never can, I will achieve some sort of closure. I owe that to Gene and to our unborn child, and to any other children we may have in the future, and I owe it to you. Even though I know how unlikely it is that you will ever read this, and that you will not even be born for another thirteen years. _

_Goodbye, my own dear Mols. I hope you will know that, whatever happens to me, in this life or any other, I will always love you and remember you and miss you. I hope that wherever and whenever you are, you will always remember me, and that you will grow up into the strong, clever, brave woman I have always known you will be. Please try to forgive me for leaving you, and understand why I had to do it. _

The letter broke off at this point, and resumed further down the page. It was written in a different ink, and the handwriting was slightly different, as though the writer's eyesight was less good than it had been.

_30 January 2018_

_I didn't sign this letter back in 1983 because I knew that there would always be more that I wanted to add to it, and there was no point in finishing it when you wouldn't be alive to read it for so many years to come. I put it away and got on with the life that I was allowed, with my beloved husband and two wonderful children. But now everything has changed._

_Gene is dead._

_He is gone, and without him, I am nothing. All these years he had been my whole life, as I was his, and together we reached for the stars. I know how fortunate I have been, and how much I still have - my son and daughter, their families, all my friends. But it's as though I'm an old fashioned clock, and when he died, someone took the mainspring out. I can't go on. He died so suddenly that I knew nothing about it until the manager of his golf club rang me to say that he had collapsed and that the ambulance crew had been unable to revive him. I never had the chance to say goodbye to him, to tell him again how much I loved him and how much he always meant to me. I think he knew, but I still needed to say it, and I couldn't. Just as I was never able to say goodbye to you. _

_We had been living in Spain since we both retired. Secretly I'd wanted to stay in England, near to our children. But it was better so. If I'd been living in England, I would have met people whom I knew in my other life, and it would have become increasingly difficult to explain away. And I have wanted so much to contact you, especially after my death in 2008, even more since Gene died. But what would the point have been? You had seen me die in 2008. If I had come back into your life and claimed to be your mother, you would have rejected me as some madwoman. It would have caused us both unimaginable pain. I have never been able to tell anyone about my other life for fear of being thought insane, and Gene and our children would never have believed me if I had told them that I had borne a child in 1996 who was not his. We were all together all through that year, and they would have known that it could not be true. They would all have been terribly hurt. Evan knew me in the 1980s, and I could have got in touch with him to ask after you. I could have tried introducing myself to you without telling you who I am. But I am so afraid that if I contact you again in any way, I might somehow put you in danger. I have tried and failed so often to change the past, that I know that I must not interfere with the future. The price for my saving all our lives when I decided to die in 2008 and live in 1981, was that I could never see you again. However hard it is for us both, I must leave you to work out your own destiny. _

_Yet something still tells me that it might be easier for you to believe what I have to tell you if you read it, than if I were to tell you to your face. That it might even help you. So I am finishing this letter, and I will seal it up with a snapshot taken shortly after I arrived in 1981, so that you can see that it really is me writing this. I will hand it to my dear son Sam, and I will tell him that, if ever he should meet you after I am gone, it will be up to him to decide whether or not he should pass it to you. I know that he is the kind of man who can make that decision. I will also ask him, if he finds you, to be a guardian angel to you, just as his father was to me, and to treat you like another sister. I know that he will._

_I know that I do not have very long here now. You must not grieve for me. Your grieving should all have been done in 2008. I know that somewhere, Gene is waiting for me, and I am waiting until I can join him, wherever he has gone. God grant that, someday a long time ahead, you and I will meet again there._

_I have just one more thing to say, and it is very important: Beware of Arthur Layton. I know that he is still at large after all these years. He is a dangerous and evil man. Even now, he could still try to harm you, and Evan if he is still alive. You will know that, when he kidnapped me, Layton phoned Evan and said that he would tell me the truth, why my parents died. After he rang off, and before he shot me, he told me that Grandad had discovered that Gran was having an affair with Evan. That Grandad grew so bitter and twisted that he paid Layton to blow the car up with him, Gran and me in it, to keep us together forever. I died believing that. But when I went back to the 1980s, I have discovered that it was all a pack of lies. I met both Gran and Grandad, and Evan, who worked for them then, and I came to know Gran and Evan very well. Of course, none of them knew who I really was. They just thought that I was a slightly eccentric police officer. I tried so hard to save Gran and Grandad from Layton's bomb, but I was unable to change what had already happened. At the very last moment, Gene and I tried to warn them, and we witnessed the explosion. I had to watch my parents die all over again. I saw a little girl, my younger self, shielded from that horror by a tall man in a black coat who carried her away to safety. It was Gene, my Gene, saving the child who later grew up to become the woman who would travel back in time to fall in love with him. I think that was when I first realised that he and I were destined for one another. Later he helped Evan get custody, so it was due to him that Evan was able to bring me up._

_But when we were investigating the blast, we learned why Layton had done it. It was because he had taken a grudge against Grandad, something about the way Grandad had conducted his case after Gene and I arrested him, and he hated Evan because he worked for Grandad. So he had plotted to murder Gran, Grandad and me, and get Evan blamed for it. I had only escaped by the merest chance. After the explosion, Layton disappeared, leaving forged evidence implicating Evan, which Gene destroyed to protect Evan and my younger self. That meant that Gene and I were never able to pin the murders on Layton. He didn't surface again until he shot me in 2008, trying to finish the job he started back in 1981. So beware of him. He might try to destroy you because you're my daughter, and Sam and his sister Carrie because they're Gene's children. If ever he is caught and brought to trial, he may try to repeat his claims. But he will have no proof. Whatever he says, remember, it will all be wicked lies from a wicked man. _

_When I first wrote this letter, I finished by saying goodbye to you, thirteen years before you were born. Now I say goodbye again, knowing that if, God grant it, you are still alive, you are now a woman. I hope and pray that you have everything that you could have wished for in your life, that you succeed in all that you choose to do, that you have health and happiness, and that you learn, as I have, that the greatest blessing in life is to find someone whom you love more than yourself, and to be loved in return. The one abiding sorrow of my life is that I will never know._

_I always hold in my mind a vision of the last time I saw you, walking away with Evan across the Millenium Bridge. I blew you a kiss, and you jumped up to catch it. I will never forget the ecstasy in your little face at that moment. I called out to you that we'd blow the candles out together. I'm so sorry that I never made it to your party._

_Your loving mother,_

_Alex Hunt_

_You knew me as Alex Drake._

**TBC**


	6. Family Matters

**Disclaimer: I don't own Ashes to Ashes or its charaters, BBC, Kudos and Monastic do… we know the rest.**

**Many, many thanks to everyone who's given me such positive feedback for Chapter 5. I do appreciate it so much. A few words from you keeps my creative juices going!**

**I never thought that a story set so far in the future might be affected by what we've found out in Series 2. Goes to show how wrong you can be. Just think of this as AU!**

Molly read the letter with tears pouring down her face. By the time she reached the last page, she could barely see, and had to keep stopping to wipe her eyes before she could continue. Allie made to stand up and go to her, but Sam laid a hand on her arm and shook his head. When Molly finished the letter at last, she laid it down on the coffee table, as carefully as if it were made of porcelain, and she bowed her head into her hands and cried until she thought she must have shed all the tears in the world. Then she cried some more, and still more. Sam and Allie closed in on either side of her, supporting her, comforting her, until at last Molly wept out the last of her desolation in Allie's arms, her head resting on her breast, with her new friend holding her like the mother she had lost.

At last her sobs ceased. All three were silent for a long time, while Allie rocked her and stroked her hair. Eventually Molly gently disengaged herself and sat up, breathing deeply. Allie let her go.

"I'm sorry," said Sam quietly. "Mum said it was up to me to decide whether to give you the letter or not. Looks like I shouldn't have."

"No, no, you should." Molly helped herself to a handful of tissues from the box of Kleenex he had thoughtfully placed on the coffee table, and resolutely scrubbed her eyes. "I'm glad you did. So glad. It's just - " She stopped, as she realised that she had no words for what she felt at that moment. She reached for the brandy glass and downed a slug as she considered. Sam and Allie waited patiently.

"I - I can't really explain what I feel, unless - " She looked at Sam. "Will you read it?"

Sam looked very serious. "Do you think I should? It looks very private to me."

"Yes. Yes, I think you should. Both of you, if you will. Please. It concerns you too."

She felt rather than saw the glance that Sam and Allie exchanged across her, and Sam nodded. She picked the letter up and they all three read it together. Looking at it a second time, Molly felt almost eerily calm. _Shock, probably_, a distant part of her mind told her_._ Sam took one sharp intake of breath about halfway through, but otherwise he and Allie were silent until they had both finished it.

"Well..." Sam murmured, settling back on the sofa cushions. Allie said nothing, but she looked utterly dazed. Molly put the letter down, shivering with emotional reaction. Sam stood, picked up a warm woollen throw, and wrapped it around her shoulders.

"It's her. My mother wrote that." Her voice sounded to her as though it were coming from a long way away. "Where she described the last time we saw each other, on the Millennium Bridge - that's exactly what happened. She blew me a kiss and I jumped up to catch it, and she promised we'd blow out the candles together. The only other person who knows that is Evan, and why would he have told your mother? But it's impossible."

Sam sat on the coffee table, facing the two women, and pouted thoughtfully, an expression that anyone who had known his father would have recognised. "But that's what she says. Believe one impossible thing, and everything else will fall into place. Which it does."

"But _how_?" said Molly dazedly.

"I'm only a poor, simple copper. I don't know how, probably we never will. But I saw my mother writing that letter, and you've just said that it describes an event in 2008 that only you, your mother, and Evan could have known about. We know that my mother knew Evan in the 1980s, but she'd lived in Spain since 2005, and she saw hardly anyone after she came back, just a few friends and family members at Dad's funeral. So how could she have known - unless she was on the Millennium Bridge with you, in 2008?"

Logic battled in Molly's mind with the conclusion that she ached to believe. "We're talking about something that couldn't happen, but you don't seem as surprised as I'd have thought you would be. This is your mother we're talking about."

"Correct. My mother. And, it appears, yours." He flashed his brilliant smile at her, then looked serious again. "As to whether it couldn't happen - well, I'd never call Mum mad, although one of Dad's favourite nicknames for her was Mrs Fruitcake, but she was always very driven and intense, very hyper, living her life at a hundred and fifty miles an hour. She could come out with the most unexpected things." He looked very hard at Molly. "She could foretell the future."

"My God..." Molly whispered.

"Not everything," Sam went on. "But historical events rarely seemed to surprise her. Take the Lockerbie bombing, I was only a nipper of five when that happened, but I remember it because it happened so near Christmas. The whole country was in shock, but Mum just said, "I didn't remember that it happened in 1988." Which was odd, to say the least of it. Then there was 9/11. Carrie had arranged that Sondra, a penfriend of hers in the States, would fly over to stay with us for a couple of weeks in September 2001 on an exchange visit, but when Mum heard about it, she said, "No. She mustn't fly here. Tell her she mustn't come." Carrie was very upset, she'd been looking forward to the visit. As it turned out, Sondra would have been all right, she'd been planning to fly to the UK on the seventh of September, but as flight traffic was suspended for days after the attacks, she'd have been stranded over here for an indefinite period. Mum told Carrie not to go to work by public transport on 7 July 2005, when the underground and a bus were bombed. Luckily Carrie listened to her and took the day off. She was working in Russell Square then, and her office was hit by debris from the bus bomb. There were other things. I told you earlier, Mum had a good eye for investments, and knew when to take money out as well as put it in. Saved Dad a fortune on Black Monday in 1987. She knew which pop groups were going to make it big and bought their first discs - another investment. Carrie was the best dressed girl in her school because Mum knew what the coming fashions were. It was a family joke that Dad and Uncle Chris would always ask her who was going to win the Cup Final, and which horses would win the Grand National and the Derby. Sometimes she got it wrong, and they lost their shirts, but more often than not she got it right. She kept moaning about the cost to the country of the 2012 Olympics, long before it was announced that Britain would host it. Dad asked her why she was so sure that our bid would succeed, and she said, "I just know, Gene". And she was right."

"Dad's always been very into the latest technology," said Allie a little unsteadily, speaking for the first time since reading the letter. " I remember Mum telling me how desperate he was to buy a laserdisc player when they first came in."

"Yeah, I remember them. Just," said Sam. "Before your time, Molly. Great big discs about a foot across that needed a special player."

"He'd been having trouble with his old VHS video and was anxious to upgrade," Allie continued. "But when he mentioned it to Auntie Alex, she spent hours talking him out of it. She insisted that it was a fad that wasn't going to last and he'd waste a lot of money. She talked him round in the end. It was just as well, they were very expensive and he'd only just been promoted to DS. It would have made a huge hole in his salary. And it turned out that Auntie Alex was dead right. Laserdiscs went off the market after a few years. But several years later, when he asked her about buying a DVD player, she told him to go right ahead. He asked her about buying a Net MD player when they first came in, and she told him not to bother, but when he wanted to buy an iPod, she said, "Yes, Chris. This one will last."

"There were lots of incidents like that," Sam added. "Can't remember them all just now. Mum knowing these things was just a fact of life. Hell, I grew up thinking that everyone's mothers had second sight. It was a surprise to find out that they didn't. But then it all stopped. For the first time in 2008, she didn't get a single sporting winner, and when the recession started later that year she and Dad lost heavily on their investments. Dad went ballistic. We thought for a time that they'd have to sell up and come home to England, but they weathered it. I rang up to see how they were doing, and almost jokingly asked Mum why she hadn't seen it coming, and she just said, "I'm sorry, Sam. I didn't remember. I didn't know." " He paused for effect. "Whatever knowledge she had of the future, it ended early in 2008. When your mother was shot and, according to her letter, went back in time to 1981 to marry Dad and become _my_ mother."

"My God," Molly whispered again.

"Not only that. We've already established that your mother was Alex Price, the child whom Dad rescued from the car bomb. The letter says that my mother and Alex Price were one and the same person. She saw Dad save her younger self. So they were all three the same Alex - my mother, your mother, and the child." He shook his head dazedly. "It's lucky she didn't try to tell Dad this. He'd never have been able to get his head around it."

"But you can," said Molly timidly.

"Only just. I think that's because I'm her son as well as his," he said wryly. "I hesitate to say it, but it's in the genes." Allie winced. "There's one thing more. What do you know about Sam Tyler?"

"Just what it says in the letter. He was a DCI in the GMP who was in a bad car accident in 2006 and went into a prolonged deep coma during which he hallucinated about - " Her eyes met Sam's. "Oh, no."

"Yes. Remember I told you that Dad's DI, his best friend, Mum's predecessor, was killed in an accident in 1980, just before the team transferred to London? I was named after him. My full name's Sam Tyler Hunt."

"Good God," Allie breathed. "There were two of them."

"Looks like it," Sam agreed. "Two people who died and travelled back in time to Dad."

"But why him?" Molly was still struggling to comprehend.

Sam shook his head. "Can't answer that one. Maybe we'll never know. All I do know is, that the two of them changed his life. He said they were the best things that ever happened to him. They made him a better copper and a better man."

Molly frowned. "But what about Layton? He shot my mother in 2008, and she arrested him in 1981. How much does he know? You heard what he said today - "

"Yeah. Drake and Hunt, Hunt and Drake. Son and daughter." The emphasis with which Sam said it, told her that he did not want her to repeat Layton's insinuations in front of Allie.

"He knows I'm Alex Drake's daughter from 2008. But does he know or guess that Alex Drake in 1981 and 2008 were one and the same person? Can he travel in time too?"

"I don't care if he's bloody Flash Gordon. He'll be charged tomorrow, and if he starts talking about time travel, we'll get him certified and he'll end his days in a mental home."

Molly nodded.

"One impossible thing," Sam went on. "Looks like we'll have to believe it. Mind you, now I can see why she was so worried that I might think she'd been unfaithful to Dad. If she hadn't said that, and I'd found you, her daughter, born in 1996 - well, I wouldn't have known _what_ to think."

"What I'd have thought if she'd found me and claimed to be my mother," said Molly sadly. "I wish so much that she had, but I see why she didn't. To think that all these years I've mourned her as dead, and she was with you and your father and your sister. She was happy, alive..."

"But she always missed you," said Sam gravely. "That's what she says in the letter. The one abiding sorrow of her life."

"Yes. I know. She says she chose to live in the 1980s to save my life, and hers and your father's. If I had someone I loved as much as she loved me, I know I'd have had to do the same. I don't resent her having been happy without me. That would mean resenting that you and Carrie and your children are alive, and I could never do that. I'm glad she had another life with people she loved and who loved her. So glad. I just wish that I'd known before now." She stopped, swallowing back the tears that threatened yet again. "She said she was waiting until she could join your father. I hope - wherever they are - that she's found him."

Sam cleared his throat. "The very last thing she said was his name. She looked as though she could already see him there with her. Then something happened about six months after she died, shortly before you joined the team. We were going to raid a night club in Camberwell that was suspected of being a centre for drug distribution. The plod had already been deployed around the club when we arrived. PS Wilmslow was in charge, and when he saw me he jumped like a scared bunny. I asked him why he was so _very_ surprised to see us, and he said, "I'm sorry, sir, I thought you were here already. I only saw you a few minutes ago. But I thought it odd that you were in a different car, and I didn't know the people with you." I asked him what the hell he meant, and he said that he'd seen me driving slowly along the road in an old-fashioned red car, with a beautiful dark-haired woman wearing a white jacket in the passenger seat and two more people in the back whom he couldn't see clearly. He hadn't caught the full registration number, but he thought it included JLY." Molly reached for the snapshot from her mother's letter and held it out to him. "Well, you've seen from the photos how like me my Dad was, and that photo of yours shows Mum in her working clothes. She wore that white leather jacket in and out of season for years. As for the car - " He reached for the album and turned to a large photograph of his parents sitting on the bonnet of a red car. The numberplate, just visible, was JLY 751V. "That Audi Quattro was his pride and joy. Almost a part of him. "Fire up the Quattro" was his battle cry." He laid the album aside. "_They were young again._"

"Once a copper, always a copper." Molly smiled through her tears. "So they're still policing the mean streets. Together. But who can the people in the back have been?"

" I've wondered whether one of them might have been my namesake Sam Tyler. Maybe in time to come, you and I will take turns riding in there as well, and Uncle Chris and Auntie Shaz."

"It'll have to be a big old Quattro to take the lot of you," said Allie with a smile. "But your Dad always could manage anything."

"Well!" Sam held out his hand, and Molly took it. "Mum said that if I found you, I was to be your guardian angel and treat you like another sister. Welcome to the family."

"Yes." Allie hugged her.

"Thank you." Molly could hardly speak for emotion. "I can't say how much this means to me. I've felt so alone. It's been so long since I had any real family. I never felt truly at home with Dad and Judy, although they were so kind. I missed Mum too much. Now I feel I've got her back again."

"Good." Sam smiled again.

"As for being my guardian angel, you've been that already," Molly went on. "All day. You saved me from being blown up, arrested Layton, saved my career, worked out who I am, gave me Mum's letter, you'll charge Layton with her murder tomorrow - and now, if he starts saying things about Evan killing Gran and Grandad, or Evan having an affair with Gran, or Grandad getting Layton to blow them up, I'll know he's lying. That must be why Evan has been so scared about the prospect of Layton being arrested, all this time."

"Layton still might accuse him at the trial," said Sam very seriously. "We can't do anything about that."

Molly nodded. "Poor Evan. All these years, he's backed me up in my search for revenge on Layton, and it's only now I realise that he's been living in dread of what Layton would do if I found him. Mum's letter clears him, but we can't produce it as evidence."

"No, but she says that Layton hasn't got any evidence either," said Sam emphatically. "Dad destroyed it."

"I'd never have thought that your father would be the type to destroy evidence," said Molly, frowning.

"Oh, he played by the rules, but he bent them as far as they would go, when the occasion demanded. Destroying false evidence to protect an innocent man and a child, that would have been _right_ up his street."

"I'll have to tell Evan that Layton's been arrested. That news alone could kill him."

Sam considered for a moment. "What he'll be worrying about most, is that Layton could turn you against him. Maybe you can tell him that Mum told me about it. Nothing we do can affect what Layton might say at the trial, but at least Evan will know that you know the truth. It should set his mind at rest."

Molly sighed. "Yes, I'll do that. It might help."

They were all silent for a few moments, taking time to absorb what they had just learned. Molly was too absorbed in her thoughts to notice Allie glancing meaningfully at Sam, and Sam nodding.

"Molly." Allie's voice was gentle but urgent. "Stay here tonight. You're exhausted. You shouldn't go back to an empty flat like this. We've got a spare room, and I can lend you some night things. Sam can drive you to the station in the morning."

Molly only stopped for a moment to consider. She knew that everything Allie had said was true. But more than that, she understood that the invitation to stay was part of the process of accepting her into the family.

"Yes, I will. Thank you, both of you. So much. For everything."

Suddenly she felt so tired that she barely registered saying goodnight to Sam and being gently chivvied upstairs and into the bathroom by Allie. She luxuriated in a long shower, letting the warm water wash away the stress and grime of the day and the ache of the past. Cuddled in a fluffy bathrobe, she stumbled down the corridor to the spare room which Allie had already pointed out to her, and found a hot water bottle in the bed and a cotton nightshirt laid out on top. As she was about to get into bed, there was a light tap at the door and Allie came in, holding an envelope and a steaming mug.

"Your letter," she said quietly, handing it to her."I thought you'd like to have it with you."

"Thank you." Molly took it as if it were the most fragile and precious thing in the world, extracted the photo, and propped it up beside the bed. Allie smiled and pushed the mug into her hands.

"Drink all of that before you go to bed," she said in the tone of a woman who had brought up three children to take their medicine. Molly sat on the edge of the bed and sipped it gratefully.

"Mmm. Horlicks."

"With cinnamon. You'll be out for the count in five minutes. Never fails." Allie bent and kissed her cheek lightly. "Sleep well, love. Sam's said it already, but I'll say it again. Welcome to the family."

She crept out. Molly sat there for a few minutes, finishing her drink, and then collapsed into bed, barely able to keep her eyes open. The last thing she saw before she sank into a heavy sleep was her mother's photograph, smiling down at her.

"Good night, Mum," she murmured. "Thank you. I'm not alone now."

-oO0Oo-

Allie returned to the living room to find Sam sitting on the sofa, wine glass in hand, lost in thought. She sat beside him, curled her feet up beneath her, and laid her head on his shoulder.

"You think she and I are both mad, don't you?" he said into the silence.

"I knew your Mum," said Allie tactfully, "and I know the things she could say. What she seemed to know. And I know something else, too."

"What's that, love?"

"She saved my Mum's life twice before she married Dad, first from Layton and his gang, and then when that Hollis stabbed her. If it hadn't been for her, none of us would be here - not you, me, Carrie, nor the kids. I believe in divine sendings, Sam. If your Mum did - come from another time - then I believe that she was sent to 1981 for a reason, and that reason was to be Mum's guardian angel and to make your Dad happy. Just as Sam Tyler was sent. He saved both our Dads, and Auntie Annie and Uncle Ray."

Sam breathed out slowly. "Thanks for that, love. I was afraid you'd disagree with what I'd done."

"No." Allie snuggled her head closer into his shoulder. "Do we tell anyone else about this? Carrie? Mum and Dad?"

Sam considered. "I'd have liked to tell Carrie. But it's hard to imagine anyone who hasn't been here tonight believing it. It's been hard enough for _us_ to believe it. That girl's in a very fragile state, and if we tell someone who thinks she's a fruitcake - or that _we_ are - I don't know what it would do to her. Let's introduce her to Carrie, and to your Mum and Dad, when we have the opportunity, and see how they all get on. We can start tomorrow. Ring your Mum and Dad and tell them that Layton's in the coop. On Sunday we'll invite them and Molly to dinner, and introduce Molly to them as the officer who nailed Layton. Then we'll have to see how it goes from there. I'm her guardian angel now, sweetheart, and that's a heavy responsibility."

Allie smiled into his neck, then sat up and looked him in the eye. "Do you believe it? Really?"

Sam drained his glass and put it down before replying. "All I can say, love, is that there are more things in Heaven and Earth than are dreamt of in a copper's philosophy. Especially where Mum was concerned. She believed it, and that's good enough for me. More than that, there are just too many things Molly told us for it to be nothing more than coincidence. So, yes, I believe it. But if none of it is true, if Mum was deluded and we've given her letter to someone who has no connection with us, then we've found a frightened, lonely kid and given her a sense of having a family and a home. Whichever, I like to think Mum would have approved."

-oO0Oo-

Molly awakened the following morning, having slept like a top, and feeling more deeply refreshed than she had done in months. Allie brought her tea and asked her if she wanted breakfast in bed. "Breakfast with the kids is always pandemonium, I'm afraid."

"Oh, no, that's all right. I don't want to hide away. I'll be down soon."

_I've been hiding away for far too long_, she realised. Even a small thing like having breakfast with a noisy family would be a step in the healing process. _Towards starting again. Just as I know Mum would have wanted._ The prospect did not seem so daunting now.

After breakfast, Sam swept her out to the Nissan, and they drove off with the whole family waving and calling their goodbyes from the doorstep. Molly wiped her eyes. _Such a little thing, to move me so much._

"But, Guv, this isn't the way to the station."

He flashed her a smile for reverting to his work title without being prompted. "I know. I'm taking you home first, so you can change before you start work." She looked down at herself and smiled ruefully. She did look a bit crumpled after the rigours of the previous day. "Then I want you to go and see Mrs Helen Cobb, secretary of the Borough Market Association." He fished a piece of paper out of the glove box. "There's the address and phone number. See if she can give us anything that could help us on these muggings."

"Right, Guv."

After that, stay away from the station until midday." He pulled the car to the side of the road and looked at her very seriously. "Bill and I will be charging Layton this morning. After that he'll be transferred to jail. I don't want you in the building until he's out of it."

**TBC**

**A/N: The sighting of the Quattro in Camberwell was inspired by the lovely BBC1 ident for Series 2. Readers outside the UK can find it on YouTube.**


	7. Guardian Angels

**Disclaimer: BBC, Monastic and Kudos own Ashes to Ashes, all I own are the characters I invented.**

**Once again, thank to everyone who has kept with this story, and especially to those kind souls who have reviewed it. It really is appreciated. **

**Last chapter coming up. I know it's time to update when the previous chapter has been bumped off the A2A front page by this flood of great new fics!**

**As always, please let me know what you think!**

Molly spent some time talking to Mrs Cobb, a bright, middle-aged lady who gave her a wealth of information on the market's opening times, the stallholders who had pitches on each day of the week, the locations of the stalls, and their merchandise. Most of the attacks had been carried out on stallholders as they packed up for the day or were preparing to bank their takings. Looking at a diagram of the stalls and noting the places where the attacks had occurred. Molly could see a pattern emerging, although there was no answer yet. Leaving the Market Association office, she looked at her watch. Ten-thirty. After only a moment's consideration, she headed for the Tube and travelled to a luxurious flat in Pimlico.

She rang the doorbell, and after a short wait the door was opened by an elderly, bearded, frail-looking man who brightened up with pleasure at the sight of her.

"Scrap! How lovely to see you. Do come in."

Molly smiled. "Hello, Evan." Privately she was shocked to see how much he had deteriorated in recent weeks. _When I was a child, he was always so vital. He started to go downhill when Layton was arrested in 2011. God knows what he's been going through since I told him last week that Layton was back in London, and what I have to tell him now will make him even worse._

He saw her through to the elegantly appointed living room, decorated with prints of the foreign places which he had always longed to see, but had never been able to visit. _Poor Evan, he gave up so much to look after Mum._

"Tea, Scrap?"

"No, thanks, I can't stay long, and I've just been to see a potential witness who filled me up with coffee and buns."

They sat down together on the large leather sofa. "So, how come you're here this time of day? Shouldn't you be on duty?"

"Well spotted. The Guv wanted me out of the station for a couple of hours while he charges someone we arrested yesterday. Arthur Layton."

"Oh." Evan's already pale face went almost bloodless, but he quickly rallied. "After so long. Oh, Scrap, I'm so pleased for you."

"It could be a long time before he comes to trial, if at all," said Molly, a shade too quickly, conscious that she was watching his reaction too closely. "The Brazilian authorities want him too, in connection with a murder there last year, and his lawyers will try to draw out the process as long as they can. He's old now, and he doesn't look well."

"Like me," said Evan with an unsuccessful attempt at a smile.

"_Rot_," said Molly with as much conviction as she could manage, which wasn't a lot. She could see that he was in torment, and cursed herself. _I've got to find a way of telling him what Mum told me._

"Listen, Evan," she said firmly, taking his hands and looking into his eyes. "I had to explain to the Guv about my personal connection with the case. He knows now that I'm Molly Drake, and that I've been after Layton because of Mum. You know his parents arrested Layton in 1981."

"Of course." Evan's voice was faint, and he seemed to be speaking with difficulty. "Then your grandfather got Layton released, just before your grandparents were killed."

"Yes. The Guv doesn't reckon that we'll have anything on Layton for that, so I'm afraid it won't be included among the charges. But he told me that his mother kept a diary of the cases they worked on, including that one. She did that to protect her and his father. They came up against so many bad people."

"Yes," said Evan with unexpected fire. "I remember. There was one, Mackintosh. I'd lost touch with them then, looking after your mother, but I read about it in the newspapers. Their own Superintendent. He was dangerous and wicked, he killed people who got in his way. He could have destroyed them both. They were very brave to stand up to him. No wonder she wrote it all down."

"The Guv told me that he read it. It said that Layton did kill Gran and Grandad, just as we've always suspected. That he did it because he had a grudge against you and Grandad because of the way his case had been handled, and he wanted to get you blamed for it."

Evan's worn face lit up in astonishment. "Sh-she said that?"

"She also said that when Layton vanished, he left forged evidence blaming you, and the Guv's father destroyed it to protect you and Mum."

"But - " Evan hesitated and forced himself to go on. "Will your Guv produce that as evidence for the trial?"

"I'm afraid not. She destroyed it before she died."

Evan looked shocked. "I didn't know she was dead."

"She and her husband both. Two years ago." Molly strove not to make that sound important. She was not meant to have known these people. To conceal her emotion, she hugged him. "Oh, darling Evan, you must have been so afraid all these years that if I caught Layton, he'd try to accuse you over Gran and Grandad. You needn't worry any more. I know the truth now, and Mu - Mrs Hunt - her diary said that Layton hasn't got any evidence."

"Yes... the truth..." said Evan faintly. Molly released him and looked into his face. It had a smile of such beatific sweetness that it twisted her heart.

"God bless Alex Hunt," he said softly.

"Amen to that," said Molly, with tears in her eyes.

"I knew her and her husband quite well at one time, did you know? Before I adopted your mother." He spoke hurriedly, wanting to change the subject. Molly just about registered that, lost in the realisation that she could talk to someone else who had known her mother in her other life. "It's strange... her name was Alex Drake too, before they were married. She was very beautiful. Rather like your mother, actually, tall, amazing figure, dark hair, only hers was curly. One of those 80s perms. She was the first female Inspector in her Division, very fiery, very dedicated, but she couldn't have dressed less like a policewoman."

"I know. The Guv showed me photos."

"She was a bit...odd. Eccentric. Always acted as if she knew things that nobody else did. I couldn't understand what she said, half the time. But a brilliant police officer. Very much ahead of her time."

_Yes, she would have been. _

"I had rather a crush on her," Evan added, almost shyly.

"_Did_ you?"

"Oh, yes." Evan smiled at the memory. "But she only ever seemed to regard me as a father figure or maybe a favourite uncle. Which was odd, given that we were around the same age."

_No wonder. He may have been young and handsome then, but she still thought of him as her guardian._

"But to tell the truth, she never had eyes for anyone but Gene Hunt," Evan continued amusedly. "Rather an affront to my masculine pride. He was a brute and a bully, ten years her senior, as far behind the time as she was ahead of it, overweight, swore like a gang of navvies, smoked like a chimney and drank like a fish. But underneath all the bluster there was a good man, and she was the one who found that out. Then she was shot and went into a coma, just like your mother. He contacted me to ask if I knew where her daughter was."

"Her _daugh - _" _Good God, he means me. They were looking for me. Fifteen years before I was born._

"She'd mentioned a daughter, but I didn't know anything about her. I visited the hospital to tell Hunt that I couldn't help, and he was so different. Subdued, almost gentle. He'd been watching over Alex, night and day, since she'd been admitted. He was exhausted, but he wouldn't leave her. I knew then, how much they needed each other, and I tried to tell him that. She recovered consciousness about twelve hours later."

"The Guv says that they were always very happy."

"I didn't see them often after that, but I was at their wedding, and I've never seen two people so much in love. I've always liked to think that I'd helped them a little, to repay them for what they did for your mother and me. Now it looks as though they've repaid me again."

"Yes."

He closed his eyes and sighed deeply. "You were right, Scrap. I've been so afraid of what Layton might try to do to me if he were arrested again. That he'd try to turn you against me. You're all I have left."

"He won't. He can't, now," said Molly soothingly. "Oh, Evan, can you ever forgive me? For years I've thought about nothing but catching him. I didn't stop to think how it might hurt you. Even after you were so ill nine years ago."

Evan shook his head. "Nothing to forgive. You weren't to know that Layton had - had manufactured a hold over me, and I couldn't let that make me try to stop you or anyone else bringing him to book. I owed that to your mother and your grandparents. But I have been very frightened about what accusations he might make if he was caught again."

"You've given up your whole life for Mum and me", said Molly remorsefully. "All this time, I've taken you for granted, taken everything and given so little back. I hope Mum was more grateful to you than I've been."

"_Nonsense._" Evan sounded almost angry. "Don't ever let me hear you say that again. The two of you have been the best things in my life."

"But, because of us, you were never able to have your own life, never find anyone of your own - "

Evan smiled sadly. "That didn't matter. There was only one woman I was ever _really _in love with, and I couldn't have her."

"Alex Hunt?"

"No. Someone else. It was all a long, long time ago."

"Did she love you?"

"I don't think so. She was flattered by my attention, but that was all."

"Do you still see her?"

"No, she died long ago."

Inspiration struck. "Was it Gran?"

He looked horrified for a moment, but soon recovered. "Yes. Yes, it was. She was so strong and brave, it was impossible not to admire her. Pure calf love, of course, she was much older than I was. She probably just thought of me as a silly boy. Tim, your Grandad, was away a lot, and I used to visit their house to help her out with looking after your mother. Layton must have known that, and guessed how I felt about her, and he tried to use it against all of us. But there was nothing to it, really there wasn't - "

"Of course not. Oh, Evan, I'm so sorry. I wish I hadn't told you anything about Layton. I've upset you."

"No, of course you should. It's best that I know."

_He looks so tired. I 've just given him a big shock, and he's trying to cover for it._

She looked at her watch. "Sorry, Evan, I'll have to go. The Guv wants me in at noon, and I'll have to use the Tube as I haven't got my car. I'll come back this evening, if that's OK."

"Yes, please do, darling. We'll talk some more then."

She left the flat wishing that she had not come. _In one way I've made things easier for him. He knows now that I won't believe Layton. But Layton's still a loose cannon, and he could try to descredit Evan at his trial. If only Evan had told me years ago why he's been so afraid. But of course he didn't dare. When I was younger, and so bitter, I might even have thought Layton's claims were true. And whatever Evan said, it wouldn't have made any difference. I had to get Layton, whatever the cost to me or to anyone else. _

_Oh, Mum. We'll have to be Evan's guardian angels now. Just as Sam is mine. _

As she was walking into the tube station, she stopped so suddenly that someone behind her nearly cannoned into her. _He didn't know that Alex Hunt was dead. So he _can't _have met her after she came back from Spain. He _can't _have told her about Mum's goodbye on the Millennium Bridge. _

Still pondering, she made her leisurely way to the station, arriving just after noon. As she passed the desk, Sergeant Pine said, "Oh, Ma'am, the Guv said that you were to go straight to his office as soon as you got in."

"Thanks, Charlie. I hope I'm not in trouble again. I haven't been AWOL, he told me to go and see a witness first thing."

"He didn't look angry, Ma'am, and if he was, the whole of CID would know about it," said Pine judiciously.

All the same, she felt a flutter of trepidation at the pit of her stomach as she tapped at his door. Hearing his usual bark of "Come!", she opened the door and walked in. He looked up and smiled.

"Ah, Molly. Shut the door and sit down. Could Mrs Cobb help with the market muggings at all?"

She obeyed. "Nothing directly helpful, Guv, but it might help in the long term. I'll look at the witness statements again and see if I can build up a picture."

"Good, good." He leaned towards her across the desk. "Layton's been charged and been taken to the Scrubs. In view of what happened in 2011, I got them to phone me when he arrived. He's in the pen."

Molly sighed deeply. "Thanks for telling me, Guv."

"During the interview, we found that his lawyer has another card to play."

"Guv?"

"He told us that his client's suffering from prostate cancer. He's estimated to have six months left, a year at the very outside."

Molly felt as though everything were crashing around her ears. "Then there won't be a trial. Anywhere."

"I'm afraid not. I'm sorry, Molly. He's unlikely to last long enough. His lawyer said he's on pain killers now, and within four months he'll probably have to be sedated. He's in the Scrubs infirmary now, being checked out to see if it's true. I'm afraid it probably is. There would be no point in lying when it could be disproved so easily. In the circumstances the CPS will regard a trial as academic. But the Brazilians might not be feeling so lenient. And he's unlikely to be released, even to die. Not after yesterday."

Molly buried her face in her hands. "After all this time..."

"Yes, after all this time! _Think_, Molly. He must already have known when he came back to the UK."

She looked up at him, and her hands flew to her mouth. "Oh, my God, the bastard. He said yesterday that he'd been keeping an eye on me. He'd been hacking Met records, so he knew I'm with the Met and working for you. He came back, made sure I'd know where to find him, then he rigged the house and waited for me to come for him, and you to come after me - "

"Exactly." Hunt's face was as grim as a graveyard.

"You saved me. Saved us all. Guardian angel."

"Think nothing of it. Hunts saving Drakes, that's a family tradition. Mum was so headstrong, she had this habit of walking into dangerous situations. Dad reckoned that he'd had to rescue her on nearly every major case they had together. Just try not to make so much a habit of it as she did. I don't like sticks of dynamite tickling my sternum every day of the week."

"He planned this. All of it."

"What he planned was to go out in a blaze of glory. A quick, easy death, blowing the daughter of the woman he murdered, and the son of his greatest adversary, to kingdom come along with him. Instead, he'll die slowly and agonisingly, in the Scrubs hospital, with the British and Brazilian authorities fighting over a carcass that's rotting before it's dead. Like I said yesterday, some justice. Better than none."

Molly was silent for a long time, fighting her horror and disappointment. At last she was able to smile shakily and say, "Maybe that's better in some ways. With a good lawyer he could have played the system for years. At least like this, we know where we've got him."

"Yes." Hunt's face was very solemn. "No escaping from _that_ judge. No time off for good behaviour. And where he's going, he'll pay, and pay, and pay again for what he's done. To you, to Mum, to Sandoval and his other Brazilian victims, to all the drug addicts and to all the other people whose lives he's ruined."

"Above all, Evan will be safe. If only I hadn't visited him this morning. When I told him Layton was under arrest, he looked terrified. I told him what I know now, and that set his mind at rest, but he was still so afraid of what Layton might say in court. I'm seeing him again tonight, so I can tell him that there won't be a trial. That he'll be all right."

Hunt looked thoughtful. "Layton might still make some sort of deathbed confession. At the worst, Evan could face questioning, but I should be able to field that."

"Thanks so much, Guv. Sam. For everything. I - I don't think Evan's got very long either. He looks so frail. He deserves to die in peace."

Hunt nodded. "We'll both do our best for him."

"Poor Evan. I brought all this on him. All this time, I've been obsessed with revenge, without thinking or caring about what it would do to him. I've destroyed him. And I could have killed us all, yesterday."

"No. Not you. Layton. Nobody asked him to blow up our grandparents, kill Mum, blackmail Evan, or try to wipe out the four of us," said Hunt strongly.

"But - Layton - "

"Yes?"

Molly bowed her head, thinking through everything she had learned during the past twenty-four hours. He was silent, letting her take her time.

"All these years, I've wanted nothing but revenge on Layton for killing Mum," she said at last. "But now I've got it, I know what it's done to Evan, and I've come close to destroying myself with hatred and bitterness. Maybe I would have done, if it hadn't been for you and what I learned yesterday."

"Revenge is hardly ever worthwhile, just for itself," Hunt agreed. "It's said to be a dish best served cold, but more often than not it turns to ashes in the mouth."

"But if I _hadn't_ gone after Layton, I'd never have known what really happened to Mum and we'd never have known that we're related. So Layton drove Mum and me apart, but in finding him, I've found out the truth. About Mum, about Gran and Grandad, and about you. I've found her family, after so many years alone."

"Don't start thanking him," said Hunt drily.

"I'm not. But - in that sense, my revenge has been worthwhile."

"I should say so. For both of us. I've found another sister, and we've nailed a vicious, murdering bastard who deserves everything that's coming to him. Talking of bastards, I sent Frank and a couple of plods round to Nine-Toed Eddie's place. He'd scarpered, but traffic cops nailed him doing a ton on the M25. Looks like he was trying to get to the Dover ferry. He probably didn't know that Layton planned a demolition derby on his house, but he's been harbouring a known criminal. With luck we should get him to spend a bit of time at one of Her Majesty's lodging houses too."

Molly was able to smile. "Thanks, Guv."

"Thank _you_ too, for remembering my title in the workplace. I'm afraid we won't be able to tell anyone here we're half-brother and sister."

Molly nodded. "I know. It would be altogether too complicated. But we'll both know, and so will Allie. That's the main thing."

"Indeed it is. In the meantime, Allie and I would like you to grace us with your presence for lunch this Sunday. Uncle Chris and Auntie Shaz are coming. They'll be glad to meet the DC who tracked down Arthur Layton."

"Oh, thank you. You know I'll love to come. It'll mean so much to me, to meet people who knew her."

He smiled. "I know. That's why I'm asking."

"Will you tell them? About Mum, and me?"

"Not right away, if you don't mind. Give them a chance to get to know you first, then we'll all see whether it would be a good idea. Same applies to Carrie, you'll have to meet her soon too."

She nodded. "Yes. I think that's best. I'd be a bit nervous of our trying to explain it to anyone I don't already know."

"Good." He smiled again. "In the meantime, let's see whether what Mrs Cobb told you can help us get that bloody mugger out of Borough Market."

Understanding that she was being dismissed, and that their relationship was returning to a professional footing for the time being, she rose. "Sure thing, Guv."

She returned to her desk and renewed her work on the Borough Market statements. Suddenly something seemed to jump out at her. _A connection._ Three of the victims stated that their attacker had said, "Hope I didn't hurt you, but my need is greater than yours". _Now, who do we know who uses that phrase? _ Suddenly galvanised, she tore into the database, did a quick word search, and came up with a string of statements from a series of house robberies which the team had cracked eighteen months ago. A member of the gang had said, "Our need is greater than yours." Froggy Winterton, released two months ago on parole, reduced to working solo while the rest of the gang was still inside. _Just before the muggings started._

"Right, Frogs, my lad, we're a-coming for you!" she murmured gleefully as she printed the statements. Longing to show the Guv how she had repaid his faith in her, she picked up the whole sheaf of papers and surged into his office, crying, "Guv, the Borough Market muggings - I've made the connection! Froggy Winterton - ", only to halt in embarrassment as she realised that he was not alone. A man whom she had never seen before sat in the chair facing the desk. "Oh, I'm so sorry, Guv. I didn't realise you were busy."

The Guv looked up with a smile. "That's all right, Molly. Come in. As you know we've been waiting on a new DI. Andy Carling. Welcome on board, Inspector."

The newcomer beamed. "I'm so proud to be working for you, Sir. It's been my ambition. My father was your father's DS for most of his career."

"Yeah, and my Dad used to say your Dad was a div!" the Guv growled, but his eyes were twinkling. "Carling, meet DC Molly Drake. The two of you will be working a lot together."

Carling stood and held out his hand to Molly. "Delighted." She shook hands and looked a long way up into a friendly face, topped by a thatch of dark blond hair, with the bluest eyes she had ever seen. He smiled, and she felt her knees melt.

The Guv draped one long arm around each of their shoulders and looked from one to the other. "Well! With a Hunt, a Drake and a Carling on the team, not to mention a Skelton looking after the little 'uns at home, it looks like South Londoners can sleep easier in their beds at night!"

As they both looked at him, Pine came puffing into the room. "Call just in, Sir. Attempted robbery and arson at the Freemans' mail order warehouse in Clapham Road."

"On our way." The Guv grabbed his coat and raced out of the office, bellowing for Bill and Frank. Molly and Carling looked at each other, and he smiled again, gesturing that she should go first. She smiled back.

_Well, Mum,_ she thought as she followed the others out to the car with Carling behind her, _maybe I'm allowed more than one guardian angel. Just maybe._

**THE END**


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